February 2010

I often think it might be easier to see what I wrote before and add to it rather than this blank index looking card of a blog. February in the basement has been cold and dark but I started something new for me. I have worked on plein air pieces then took to making pen and ink drawings, like Robert Henry, and using charcoal to create darks, depth and distance. You can see them hanging over my work table. Using those drawing to start a painting resulted in pieces like this on the left.

or this on the right. This painting actually has changed since I took the photo.
I added birds in the upper left.



These paintings were hard because the color and the translation from the simple drawing to a representation seemed not to work quite right. I had trouble making the color come right and sometimes I seemed to get stuck on the image before I felt I had fully worked out the drawing. I think that may be the nature of representation. I wanted to escape my own trap so I have started some watercolors which give me the freedom to play with color as I develop or search out an image.
I use the same black and white drawings to start an image and use color and the water to wash around in search of what is buried there. I have found a few interesting starts this way.


The watercolor to the left here I have started as a oil. I again tried sketching the composition in oil pastels and have added tube oil on top. It seems to have a new feel, less restrictive but open to imagination. I have found myself with an intuitive idea about how something should go. I think this is the best way for me to paint. It feels very free and poetic.
I do not always like to show something in progress, but I think it may be interesting in this case for me. This to the left is the oil I started and am working on. Images have come out of what is put down, even beyond the watercolor.

I was in Washington at a conference and saw the artwork of Brian Jungen at the Museum of the American Indian. He does art the way it should be done, with social commentary, humor and imaginative design. Lots of places to see his work but here is a link to an article.