DS Fishing Blog

So, like many of you, I devote some time every day to checking into the virtual fly fishing world.  If I can't be on the water fly fishing, then I can not be there with others that feel my pain.  Well, last week while I was peeking in on some of my favorite fly fishing blogs I came across  Jeff Kennedy's site.  Jeff is an artist who has a blog about his commitment to paint 365 flies in as many days.

Now, I work in the arts myself and my artistic tastes can be called eclectic.  I'm hard to please and I steer away from what I view as kitschy.  I don't care for the arts when it's followed by the word crafts.  I love to tie flies, but even the most glorious are (or should be) functional.  When I see shadow boxes filled with flies, I tend to roll my eyes.  Well, at least the flies are mounted and not the trout.  So, I was prepared to have a similar reaction to Jeff's work.  On the contrary, I absolutely loved it.

I spent quite a bit of time looking at Jeff's work and I was smiling the whole time.  First, I can appreciate the depth and detail of his fly renderings, but it's his backgrounds that add the magic for me.  The BWO Cripple above is a perfect example (watercolor and gouache).  The abstract blending of color and texture takes what would be a wonderful painting of a fly and elevates it to a work of art that would look great in my living room.  (Jeff, this is where you infer a wink followed by another.)

I highly recommend checking out more of his work.  He plays with different mediums and themes and some of is it quite fun.  I'll leave you with a taste of his angling anime.  Why, of course her name is Brook!

Check out Jeff's site here: drawingflies365

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