Elephants march

I started walking to work as soon as the weather got nice. Every day, I take the same streets but yesterday I caught a glimpse of this wall:

A plain, grey brick wall on an old and somewhat decrepit building.Only that this time, my mind recorded ...elephants marching!!! I am not kidding ... I went back to take a picture of the wall and then added the elephants when I got home.

Les journées de la culture

This past weekend there were "Les journée de la culture" and I participated in an activity with Huguette Bernais. It was fun and I came out with this abstract landscape:

 I thought about adding some ink lines, but I am holding onto that for now. Maybe there will be another incarnation of this. I think I'd like to mount it on canvass or wood eventually. To be continued...

Spring garden

Acrylic on Aquarius II paper

Another painting on synthetic paper using the same approach - spilling paint, going on a scavenger hunt for shapes, followed by what seemed to be hundreds layers of glazes.

Abstract landscape

Acrylic on Aquarius II paper 

I wanted to try this synthetic paper. It is very light and it folds nicely, but I had some difficulty applying the pigment. I expected the drying time to be much longer because it is synthetic paper, but the paint disappeared" almost immediately. On the positive side, this paper takes a lot of beating. In the end it did curve though and I did not stretch it back. This is why the image is a bit off at the bottom. I have another big sheet that I might use for watercolor sketching...

Abstract flowers

This is the second incarnation of a panel I already posted. I was not too happy with the result, so I decided to add some collage. The shapes come from one of the junk mail books. I copied them on artist tissue paper and glued them over the existing shapes.

Swimming

This is an abstract I managed to finish in between cleaning and dusting around. I called it "Swimming" because the images at the bottom made me think about two people swimming.

I could not make up my mind which way to display the painting. I decided that I will turn it around whenever I get bored. It is 6x6 and abstract, so that should work. For now, I chose this display:

I framed both of them and displayed them side by side:

Gradient

I went AWOL lately because I am taking three classes with Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen over at the Land of Lost Luggage, a sketching class with Alisa Burke and a fiction writing class. So far, I am enjoying the process but it takes a while to finish a piece. That's ok because the paintings will be better.

Here are two of them. The exercise was to create a gradient of color using glazes.

Sand dunes

A while back I found a picture in one oh the old photography magazines my brother-in-law gave me. It was a close up of a patch of sand on the beach. I liked the photo and  I decided to turn it into an abstract-ish painting. Unfortunately, I do not remember where I found the photos so I cannot post a comparison.

The canvass has been used previously, once for a Picasso-ish face and once for flowers. It is a gallery-style canvass and the sides are painted black. The original looks a bit more purple, but my camera altered the colors a bit.

Abstract collages

I found Ann Baldwin's Creative Paint Workshop at the library this past Saturday. I like her collages, they tell wonderful stories. I spent a lazy Sunday playing with paints and the day passed in a blink.

 

Here, I glued wallpaper on leftover mat board. I am trying to figure out what to do with four walpaper sample books, so I wanted to see how it handles paint. It takes glazes and dry brushing well, but it is platified so the washes won't work. I have lots of this wallpaper - I thought that maybe I will make a journal. Or use the books as journals, except that they are heavy and cumbersome. Anyway, back to the abstract. It was ment to be a study in using texture as the subject of an abstract. It is an attractive idea because it means that all I need is...well ... texture. In other words, I do not always need to start with a real life object and build from there. This is good news because I get lost in that process. If I concentrate on one thing at a time, such as texture or lines or color, then I could still have a finished painting in the end. Once I finished, I saw the space in between the textured surfaces at the bottom. First thought was about how to transition between the surfaces and in the end I decided to let it be. Later, I saw the male profile neatly delineated between the cotton lace and the molding paste surface. Next project is going to be a collage.

Abstract study

Busy week, not too art-friendly. I managed to finish an abstract study I started last weekend. The first time I tried to use the cruciform format for an abstract painting, I ended up with a face. This time, I was determined to stay away from faces. I sort of succeeded. The inspiration for the palette came from a pillowcase with indian motives. I added yellow, green and a darker blue. I did not plan for God to be included, it just happened.

Abstract I

This past weekend was a long one and I decided to play with the abstract painting concepts outlined in Laura Reiner's book.

First attempt: use one's name as a starting poing for absract composition. I used a piece of watercolor paper with the background already painted and I wrote down my name, then extended lines and filled in the spaces and ... voila! I enjoyed the procsess. The final colors are a bit too dark, but the background was dark to begin with.


Second try: use of a cross pattern as a layout for the composition. I used all 5 shades of Golden reds by applying washes of various intensities and created the cross shape. But then, while I was trying to figure out what next, I "saw" two eyes staring at me from the white spots left on paper. So I used different lines formed by the shades of paint and this is what I came up with:


And finally, using a picture as a source for an abstract painting. I think I made a mistake in starting it as an abstract but then trying to squeeze realism into it. I used a postcard from the Grand Canyon as inspiration.



I used to think abstract painting is "easy" - after all it is only lines and squares and rectangles and blobs of color... Hmmm ....I reconsidered the preconception (false false false!!!). There might be squarea and blobs, but figuring out how to place them so that the whole makes some sense it is not always easy, I would think.

Another experiment was using a photo from a amagazine as an underpainting for a portrait. I used Sarah Jessica Parker - believe it or not. An advertisement for some face cream or something. I worked in my altered book journal. After I glued the face, I applied matte medium and then gesso diluted with a bit of water. I was after a different final effect which I cannot explain but I know I will know when I get there.