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These are representative paintings I've done during my life. All of my wildlife pen-and-ink drawings are lost. Many more paintings have been lost than are shown. For example, I did portraits of my Mom and of my Grandma Cartwright. Teresa Cartwright was also an artist. She taught me a lot and lent me her art books. My family has several of her artworks.
I had so many paintings, I kept them in my parents' crawl space in Lake Forest, IL. When they moved, I think they were left behind. Generally, people didn't go into the crawl space.
Here are some steps and techniques:
Please note: I have not always followed my painting process.
As I learn more, I change the process.
In the past, I used stretched Belgian linen for my canvases, then I moved to Masonite, and then to Masonite over plywood. Now, I use archival wood panels.
I also switched from Liquitex acrylics to Open acrylics. Open acrylics take longer to dry, allowing me to blend colors on the canvas.
In the past, I used either Liquitex matte or gloss medium for varnish. I consistently use 2 separation layers of Liquitex gloss medium and 1 layer of Gamvar varnish.
I use reference photos or famous artists' work for many of my paintings.
#1 for 2026. Started 01JAN2026 and completed 07JAN2026. Acrylic. 12x16 inches. 2 separation layers and Gamvaar varnish.
Study for a larger painting of a bald eagle landing on a dead tree. Reference photo from an unknown source. For some reason, I mistakenly thought this was primarily a blue, gray, and violet picture. So, my goal was to use a limited palette of gray colors. However, this didn't work. The gray paint set I bought didn't accurately reflect the colors in the reference photo.
#2 for 2026. Started 14JAN2026 and completed 30JAN2026. 11x14 inch.
My 2nd watercolor. Reference photo from an unknown source.
Limited Windsor-Newton palette: white, lamp black, raw umber, and yellow ochre. I painted in this order: background, antlers, and body. Next, I outlined the face. I had trouble finishing this because the face looked like Bullwinkle! I wanted a realistic moose and not a cartoon. So, I didn't do anything for 7-10 days.
#3 for 2026. Started 07FEB2026 and completed 12APR2026. Acrylic. 9x12 inches pre-stretched canvas. 2 separation layers. Gamvar varnish.
The painting above is of a Rocky Mountain Toad. The reference photo is one I took in Ben's backyard. Ben was working on a garden bed, and the background shows some weed barrier and yellow clay soil. The background is nothing like the picture and isn't supposed to be realistic.
My original goal was to create a painting using a hyper-realistic style. The standard beginner reference photo is a human eye. But I didn't know what I would do with a giant human eye.
I watched several YouTube videos, and there seem to be two hyper-realism approaches:
Paint every square inch hyper-realistically, or
Block in the colors and then add the hyper-realism on top.
I did the second approach. However, I was very disappointed after the block-in. You can see the block-in in the rear end of the top photo. I thought it looked like garbage. So, I stopped working on it for several weeks.
But, I have an irrational love of toads, and couldn't stay away.
With a hyper-realistic style, one reference photo isn't enough, and copying it "as is" misses the point. The point is to make it more real than it is in the photo.
In the finished painting, you can see an extra toe on each left foot. I spent almost 4 hours getting the eye right. It isn't like the photo at all.
original work
#4 for April 2026. Acrylic painting on a 12x16-inch watercolor painting board. 2 separation layers and Gamvaar varnish.
The goal was to make a throw-away sketch. This is my version of Y.V.N.'s "After the Rain."
I enjoy watching YVN paint. He seems to have a ridiculously large palette of pre-mixed colors, and he's ready to go. YVN seems to apply the right colors in the right spots and never second-guesses or glazes to tune the colors. He has no drawing or underpainting. He catches the atmosphere and depth through his pre-mixed color choices.
Original Watercolor 2025: I used chatGPT to apply a watercolor style to an original phograph of a mountain lion to get a reference image.
My version of Willem Kalf's still life with Roemer, 2023
Trilobytus Antikythera: Ben Cartwright
original work
I worked on this painting on and off for over 5 years. The first version was an outline drawing in a style similar to a wildlife illustrator. Next, I built up the Trilobyte with Liquitex modelling paste. Finally, I added colors.
Tina Harris: Aaron and Elizabeth Harris
original work
Spiderman: Adam Cartwright
original work of Washington DC in winter
Spiderman vs Black Panther 2016: Ben Cartwright
My version of the original by Simone Peruzzi
Elizabeth Cartwright
original work
My version of Vermeer's, "Lace Maker": 1977
Batman 2012: Adam Cartwright
My version of Alex Ross's original, "Batman: Knight Over Gotham".
2025: I added two coats of Liquitex Gloss Medium as a separator and then Gamvar as a varnish. I removed the matte and reduced the frame size.
Ironman vs Mandalorian
I used chatGPT to generate a reference image, which I used for the painting.
New York from photo about 1965
Sandy Michel: 1975-1977: whereabouts unknown
Willem Kalf: one of many: whereabouts unknown
Since I am color-blind, there is one, where the lemon's inside is green. That's lost too
Bad Chess Player (bad painting): whereabouts unknown; about 1976; sold to Lillian Michel
Colored pencil ~1970-1973 - middle school
Completed at Art Camp about 1973
White T-Shirt is me; Guy with side-burns is Keith Ginsburg; So, this would have been done when I was in elementary or middle school
original work. Colored pencil. poor quality paper.
I've done Willem Kalf's painting (colored pencil drawing here) many times. The reference photo is from the Time-Life Library of Art. Whereabouts unknown.
1/3 of fish: whereabouts unknown; Perhaps, 6th grade; about 11-12 years old. Colored pencil.
pelican painting, 2023
close-up of pelican
Maryland Farm, Ben Cartwright
My version of Young Woman with a Water Pitcher by Johannes Vermeer. The image is poor and was captured from the background in a ~1978 photo of my work at an art fair. Whereabouts unknown.
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