Tag: painting

Finally…down to work.

Art, painting, Studio practices, Uncategorized

I really meant to post more on this blog but somehow what with trying to source groceries online, worrying about my very vulnerable spouse, getting a raised bed up and running for the first and time tidying the rest of the garden after a very wet winter I didn’t manage to get anything finished in my studio. It has been a difficult time for everybody but for me at last I have managed to clear the back log and got into my studio to finish off this triptych started in response to the Australian fires which seem a long time ago now.

Before
Inferno
After

Wood and fire stage 2

Art, painting, Studio practices, Uncategorized

Today I’ve added one or two more collaged bit of paper and covered the picture with a a glaze of Indian Yellow which gives it a more orange appearance and unifies it as a whole. I think its finished though I may add one or two thinner lines in the background but at the moment I am leaning towards leaving it as it is. This not a very good photo as its too wet and windy to take a canvas outside to photograph.

Sea Kale again

Art, painting, Studio practices

A while ago I shared my work on a painting called Sea Kale which had languished in my studio for a couple of years. Having just registered for the 2020 Chichester Art trail I decided I had better get on with finishing it. Its always hard stopping and starting a painting with long gaps between work and as I began I realised just why it was the painting got pushed to the back of the pile in the first place. As I started I wondered what fit of madness had made me attempt the thing in the first place but I have a thing about finishing things so gritted my teeth and got on with it. After a while I began to feel chilly as I did not have the heat on though I did warm the studio, a log cabin in the garden, before I began. Oil paints make fumes so its not a good idea having a heater going whilst working with them. Before you get your violins out, its long way from the starving artist in a garret and I do retreat to the warm house when I get cold. Any way the painting progressed though its not finished and there are many hours of frustration left in it!

Ghost forest,

Art, painting, Studio practices

I was so distressed at the sight of the burning Amazon forest and all that means for the animals trees and humanity that I got a large, 100×120 canvas on my easel to express what I feel. In the end I settled for covering the canvas with red, orange and yellow alkyd oil paint diluted with thinners. I allowed the paint to drop from the top edge rather like tears then took a cloth to wipe out the shapes of trees using photos of the forests as shape guides to make them appears negative images, like ghosts. Alkyd oils are quick drying and can reworked again after six hours especially when thin. The next step was to turn the painting upside-down and dribble black paint down the canvas wiping the trees clean again after. I’ve added some grey and one or two white bits. This makes no difference to the forest but helped me with the grief I feel.

‘Riot in the garden’ finished?

Art, Eye candy, Garden, painting, Studio practices, Uncategorized

This painting in oils which is 70×70 cm on box canvas started as a wild sketch but as I worked on it in my studio I was afraid of losing the wildness. I find most paintings end up as a compromise between what one sets out to do and what one is able to do. I’m sure I could go on working on it but feel to do so would end up with what I call knitting where all freedom has been lost, not that I have anything against kitting, just not in a painting. No doubt I will see things that need tweaking as it hangs around my studio though.

No longer languishing

Art, painting, Studio practices

Well my oil paints have come in from the cold and I am enjoying using them. The odourless thinners is working well and can be seen in the Bombay Sapphire gin bottle (must remember its not gin!). I enjoyed using my old oil sticks so much that I’ve indulged in a set of larger ones, Its summer and I can open the doors and windows of my studio and throw paint around with glee, so look forward to more gleeful paintings.