rediscovering painting
Daily Painting
Nagelesque
0923 days
Update: here’s the picture:
“Nagelesque,” 9″ x 11″, oil on canvas board, NFS (this baby’s a keeper!)
I finished my “Nagelesque” painting last night. I decided to do some experiementing – I used my typical restricted palette (Cad Yellow Light, Alizarin Crimson, French Ultramarine, Burnt Umber, Titanium White) and I did a quick undercoating with a #10 brush… then decided I didn’t like that so I came back through with a palette knife for the rest of it. Thick, impasto painting.
To do this, I had to mix up a lot of paint to start out with, which is something I don’t normally do. That was good for me. The first time, with the light purple, I didn’t mix up enough and had to mix more, so that sort of forced me to be able to duplicate my results. Which isn’t as easy as it sounds.
I decided to skip the underpainting, which I think was a mistake. I wanted the skin to be whitest white… so I left it unpainted. I wanted to see how that worked. Well, lemme tell ya, with no underpainting, the fine black outlining was tough because it didn’t flow, it stuck on the canvas’ rough texture. I had issues with a consistent line quality and came away a bit frustrated. Lesson learned – do the underpainting.
I didn’t take a picture of the completed piece last night – it was getting late and I was tired, and I’d really like to get some natural light on it because I’m tired of yellow and dark and non-representative images of my paintings. Ugh.
I also prepped another canvas with a more brownish mixture of Payne’s Gray (my own mixture). I’ve got 4 prepped canvases now. Quite honestly, I’m once again at the fear point of “oh, FSM, what if I ruin the drawing and underpainting?” that paralyzes me and makes me procrastinate on doing them at all. I need to remember: Break the Toy (TM).
A Nagel for me
0927 days
“Nagelesque,” 9″ x 12″, graphite on canvas board, WIP
I’ve always been a fan of Patrick Nagel. The white skin, ruby lips, solid colors, often vacant (literally blank) eyes, the classic 80′s triangular design work. I was flipping through some old sketchbooks and saw some pieces that were reminiscent of Nagel’s sketches (which I have in the book, The Art of Patrick Nagel), so I thought I’d cheat and make my own Nagel directly *from* Nagel.
Of course, I’m going to make it my own, but it’ll be very reminiscent, very Nagelesque. He did his work in acrylic, mostly, and I”ll be using oil. I’ll probably also show my brushwork, which was something he never did. And I might “break the toy” and blaspheme the paint… like maybe smear the make-up or lose the edges or some not-so-Nagel aspects that’ll make this art a reflection of the dark, dingy insides of yours truly.
Art Every Day Month
0928 days
“Lost,” 11″ x 14″, preliminary drawing on canvas board, WIP
November is Art Every Day Month. Okay, it’s not some real holiday or anything, and you won’t find it on any calendar or as an Outlook add-in. But I’m really going to give it a go this month. Something – ANYTHING – done, every day. Progress on a piece, painting, doodling, crafting spitball sculptures, whatever.
This particular drawing is on canvas and is prep work for the Different Strokes for Different Folks entry. It’ll be my third piece that I’ve entered to be displayed on Karin’s site. It’s actually sort of nerve-racking to put yourself out there like that, especially with so many great interpretations. But it’s also inspiring – your take is your take, how YOU see it, not how it is to anyone else.
As you can see, I did a grid this time. I was enlarging from a really bad printout, but that’s okay because I’m not concerned with much, just the outline. I could have free-hand drawn everything but the grid saves me some time. It’s nearly 11:30pm and I’ve got to get up before 6am and get ready for work, you know. One day this will be my full-time gig. Until then, grids are my friend. Well, maybe they still will be because I *have* learned to draw and to see but that’s not what I’m after here.
I’m calling this one, “Lost,” because it’s an image of 3 travelers, together but alone. Shadows touching without knowing. Each with their own thoughts that probably are more similar than we’ll ever know. Just being the busy little ants that we are. Where are they going? They don’t know, they’re lost in the continuum. Time-space is a void and they’re just along for the ride. They don’t know where they are or where they’ll end up. They’re lost. Aren’t we all?
Bent
0929 days
“Bent,” 9″ x 12″, oil on canvas board, $300
“Sometimes you have to break the toy.”
He said that as he was smashing something of his that he really liked. He wasn’t talking to me, he was talking to my friend, Derek, the same guy whose wife blew his head clean off with a shotgun. Different story. Anyway, Derek laughed and I didn’t really get it at the time. I wonder if Derek was laughing because the guy was crazy or if he thought it was really funny.
The moral still holds true: sometimes you have to break the toy. I get it now.
I got this idea for a painting while watching Helvetica and I sketched out a thumbnail over the weekend: a painting split at the Fibonacci point with the top half blue, tainted/dulled with a wee dab of orange, and orange on the bottom, turned rusty/dirty with a wee spot of blue. The word, “Bent,” HAD to appear across the horizontal line and HAD to stretch off the edges. Sometimes I don’t know why they come to me, these ideas just DO. Okay?
Today, as I was prepping to continue my last 2 paintings in the self-portrait series, I flipped over a canvas board and found this really old self-portrait I had begun YEARS ago. The drawing was good in a technical sense but lacked emotion. Vivacity. So I thought to myself, “Self, why not do that blue and rust thing right over this old self-portrait?”
Then, devilishly, I continued, “BREAK THE TOY.”
Bwa ha ha ha!
I broke it. I borked it. I smashed it into little bits. I covered it up in thick paint then rubbed it back out again and left the canvas raw and the paint rough and the strokes mish-mashy and every which way, and I threw in a thought that I couldn’t dismiss as I was painting: “My, you’re a dirty little boy, aren’t you?” Mmm, yes, deliciously dirty.
Falling, WIP
0931 days
“Falling,” 11″ x 14″, oil on canvas board, WIP
The fire burns cleanly when it’s hot. But looks can be deceiving. That’s why, just when you think you’ve got your shit figured out, that god-forsaken deck of cards comes tumbling down around you.
Only thing is, most of the time, for all your stalwart appearances, nobody notices. You quietly control the countenance. Just enough so you’re allowed to be alone in your inner fire. Just enough so it’s only you that knows you’re falling.
Hotel Window
1939 days
“Hotel Window,” 5″ x 7″, $100
My second official (but fourth, actually) Different Strokes from Different Folks picture. I was actually more than a little reluctant to do this one and waited a bit on it. In the end, though, I’m glad I did it. As always, I learned quite a bit from it.
I painted over a few parts because those muddy yellows and distant bluish colors were challenging to get just right. I thought about tossing all realism out the window and going for a completely abstract piece, as many others have done, but I wanted to try a few challenges.
First, I switched Burnt Sienna for Burnt Umber. I’m glad I did – I think I got some better grays and I think it interacted better with yellow. My palette is now down to Titanium White, Yellow Lemon, Alizarin Crimson, French Ultramarine, and Burnt Umber. Just 5 colors (well, technically 4 colors + white). I can get a lot of mileage out of that palette, I think.
Second, I wanted to go a little thinner on the paint, so I did.
Third, my underpainting was a heavily diluted yellow that I then blotted up with a paper towel. It was dry just about immediately. I did my drawing directly in super thinned Burnt Umber, closing one eye and using the paintbrush to measure it out. Burnt Umber, unlike Burnt Sienna, dried really quickly.
I’m very pleased with this painting. Again, not something I’d normally paint, but that’s half the point of doing the DSDF, right?!
“Becoming,” self-portrait #3
0949 days
“Becoming,” 14″ x 18″, oil on canvas board, $700
Third in the series of 5 self-portraits. The series is about me, exploring me, exploring what it takes to become an artist after all these years of denying myself and trying many, many things instead. I’m trying to let the pictures paint themselves as much as possible. Myself the idle passenger, the casual observer changing the results of the experiment simply because I’m observing it.
“Becoming” had a few inspirations. First was the idea that I read somewhere that you should paint the human face with a yellowish upper, reddish middle, and bluish lower. While I understand the reasoning, my personal opinion is that you should describe the face you see, HOW you see it. How YOU see it. So, being the impish little prick I am, I exaggerated that statement in a pseudo-mockery of it. Because I reject things dictated to me by self-proclaimed experts.
I also wanted to do a painting without any white at all. And I succeeded in that – probably for the first time ever.
Burnt Umber has been my nemesis. It always turns to mud. So I re-introduced it here in the underpainting and let a bunch of it show. Look, mama, burnt umber and no mud!
“Becoming” is about edges, mostly. The paint is becoming something because I drew in the outline in my colorful black (or my hand-mixed Payne’s Gray, if you please), intentionally losing edges and intentionally bleeding color without abandon. I put some straight black on one side to push some contrast, but I wanted to keep the painting dark. I’m becoming, but I’m not there yet. I may never be what I am to become, but I am in the process, emerging from the darkness, pushing your fucking rules aside, rejecting what you’re telling me, letting me be me.
Which is all at once intensely simple while simultaneously eluding me at every turn.
“But Still I Persist”
0950 days
“But Still I Persist,” 11″ x 14″, $450
Once again, spent a lot of time, more than I expected. Once again, I need to learn to use my camera properly.
Overall, though, I’m happy with this. The colors, the words, the pose, the title.
I also got a chance to prep a canvas for tomorrow night’s portrait, which I’ve got drawn and ready to go. Just need to paint it, and I’m intending a very loose painting for my fourth self-portrait (it’s a 5-image series), so I might be able to finish tomorrow night. That would be good because I’m getting antsy to start on the current DSFDF.
A few words on this piece.
Just when you think you’ve got it made, wham! life slams you with a zinger. You think you’re a good artist and then you see so much better. But still you persist. You try to paint more but life gets in the way. But still you persist. You have hopes of a sale and it falls through. But still you persist. Your last painting just doesn’t live up to what’s in your head. But still you persist.
A million lifetimes pass and you’re floating along in the cosmic void and you still don’t think you’ve quite got things figured out. But still, you persist.
The drudgery of another day rears its ugly head and you have a hard time getting out of bed. You’d rather be painting. But still you persist.
Those that are successful are those that are tenacious, that persist. I do this because I must. I must persist. The world will try to get me down, but still I persist. *I* will try to get me down, but still I persist. I will try to be my own saboteur. But still I persist.
“But Still I Persist,” stage 2
0953 days
Okay, got it this far tonight, it’s after midnight and I need to go to bed now…
Boy howdy, this self-portrait has been difficult. Not sure how to quantify or classify that statement, but I think it’s because I’m going for bold colors (the red background is right out of the tube) and I’m going for a VERY flat texture (as opposed to my typical impasto), and because this one has a lot of details.
I still need to do a bit on this one and it’ll probably take all of tomorrow night’s painting time:
- outline with black lines (my colorful black, which is ultramarine and burnt sienna)
- put in some detail on the star – I think I’m going to trace along the inside with red
- put in the curlyque
- lettering, lettering, lettering. This will take most of the time. And lettering in oil over wet oil isn’t exactly easy. Maybe it’ll be tacky enough tomorrow that I’ll not have any issues
Self-portraits are curious things. My wife asked me why I don’t just be honest and stamp “I am awesome” across the top, as if the self-portrait is an homage to myself. I told her, jokingly, that she doesn’t understand my art. She replied, seriously, that I’m right, she doesn’t.
But I’m okay with that. Because my art is for me. I love to share it but, even if it doesn’t sell (and right now, it doesn’t, because I’ve just started), I’ll keep doing it. Always have, always will.
“But Still I Persist,” prelim drawing
0955 days
This drawing took a lot longer than I’d expected. So I guess I’m not painting tonight. But I’m happy with the concept and the drawing, so it’s worth it. I *do* have a full time job. Maybe one day my art can be my job, in which case I can draw and paint all in the same day.
I’m not sure how I want to proceed on this. I’ve considered a few things:
- solid colors, no shading, outlined in black
- glasses and eyes/nostrils/mouth in black, the rest of my head one color, blue background, white star
- a light flesh and a slightly darker flesh (2-tone), black outlines
- a light underpainting (so I can still see the drawing) with broad, messy strokes that don’t stay in the lines. Come back through with black to outline. Come back through to clean up colors and hide all pencil lines
- throw it in the trash?
“But Still I Persist,” 11″ x 14″, preliminary graphite drawing
