Cropping is…

July 14, 2022

…something you can’t do if you’re painting onto a pre-stretched canvas. You can, however, easily crop work that is on paper or loose canvas sheet and then frame or mount that cropped work so it can be hung. Doing this makes cropping part of the finishing process of the work of art.

Ofcourse you can always digitally crop images of your work and make prints, and/or post those cropped images on social media which is one of the wonderful things about this new digital platform on which we hang our art work.

For example, below is my latest collection of abstract paintings, these are done with mixed media in my sketchbook. The theme for these is Vermilion.

Exhibit 1

My Vemillion collection is all cropped from the one page in my sketchbook - shown below.

I can’t physically hang this collection in it’s original form though because I’ve doubled up on some of the areas for the different paintings, but I could re-paint them, even in a larger format if I wanted to.

I’ve been playing with this concept, in-between my other work, all week and it’s been alot of fun.

exhibit 2

Exhibit 3

Where I will go from here is take my favourite crop and see if I can re-create it onto a larger format.

What fun!!

thinking abstract...

July 7, 2022

is different from the kind of thinking needed when painting something using a reference, (reference meaning a photo or from life, like a still-life vase of flowers, or actual person sitting, kind-of-thing).

I’m mostly interested in painting things, and I always use a reference for them - faces, portraits, animals, people, flowers, jars, even the occasional tree, landscape… and I get a likeness by observing the tones, the light areas and dark areas, of whatever it is I’m looking at.

Although my representational paintings are always semi-abstracted, sometimes even quite unearthly looking, they are still things that I’m representing with as much likeness to the reference that I can create by observing the light and dark shapes of tone in the reference I’m using, but at the same time allowing outrageous freedom to deviate in my colour choices, mark making, and composition.

So, when breaking down the process to just paint marks, colour and composition with no representation of anything, I’ve got one less thing to hold on to and it’s like walking backwards, or walking with eyes closed or… humming a song without words…no…not even that…maybe more like singing words to represent the tune of a music piece that hasn’t got any words - like Beethoven’s famous Fur Elise - try singing that tune using made up words off of the top of your head- and record yourself singing it then write those spontaneous words down in reverse, refine it so it rhymes in places, replace every 10th word with a new word, and put some punctuation in after that word only, and a semi-colon after every 10th word, then sing it to the tune of Fur Elise but in an entirely different key and that’s your painting - conceptually speaking.

That’s what it feels like to me creating abstract.

What you come up with, in the spur of the moment, is quite bizarre and often hideous and needs refining and refining until you have something visually pleasing that stands on it’s own as a work of visual poetry, something that’s more about the words themselves than a story they might tell.

It doesn’t make sense at first impression, but there’s method to the process and the method makes sense, so in the end what you see is a description of the method, not the description of a literal thing like a tree or animal…I think.

This first layer of my abstract is hideous, but just chucking something down with whatever’s in reach without thinking is the reference for the next part of the painting, and so on snd so on until it’s completed.

I don’t love it but I don’t mind the completed work - so what did I learn?

It takes layers to get enough variety for an interesting painting.

There’s more interest when things aren’t perfect - like messy edges, and muddled scribbles look good next to cleanly painted shapes.

One abstract isn’t enough, I’ve got 3 more on the go and I played around with this next one on the kitchen table after dinner.

Letting the paint dry between layers is necessary for abstract because without a reference the underpainting layers more often than not need to be drastically changed.

Cropping the abstract and framing it looks pleasing to me, but I’m not confident that it’ll please anyone else. It’s much harder to self critique your own work if there’s no reference to refer to.

It’s so much fun and the possibilities are endless.

Making abstract art you can defy all and every rule, so it gives an opportunity to explore and play with materials, concepts, ideas, and use up any leftover paint and bits and pieces lying around making it a process for recycling.

Try it.

it's 12:53pm and...

June 30, 2022

I’ve just walked into the studio after what seemed like a busy morning where it seems like I haven’t done anything at all.

what have I done, exactly?

…made daughters lunch - got her to school, gone shopping with husband (had coffee in cafe), cooked, did a few loads of washing, sorted dried washing, cleaned and tidied Pat’s room where I found the dog had vomited on the floor, fed the chickens, printed some stuff for husband…just remembered that I need to pay a bill (I’ll do that now, hang on…)

…paid bill and created a new folder (using a literal folder with metal rings in the middle) for materials purchased 2022/23…like it’s tax time and I’ve been meaning to be more organised, so new tax year begins with a new set of folders and new way of keeping my books in order… …it’s now 1:44pm.

All that stuff that doesn’t get seen in an art business - behind the scene stuff that takes time and has nothing to do with art yet it’s necessary for an art business - if art can even be a business, and maybe when art is a business it’s not art anymore but manufacturing…I’m overthinking this aren’t I!

I turn to my easel…what have I got here..?…a wet mess and a dry mess. Not what I’m suppose to be working on.

What I’m suppose to be working on is a commission which I will do a bit on every day until it’s finished. I ended up working on it for about 40 minutes and then had to pick up Pat from school and drop her at her circus classes…

close up…

of part of the painting I’m working on

later…

10:37am, Friday morning.

I have an idea.

I inherited a lovely music book along with a piano from my Aunty Pat’s estate. I’ve been having fun learning some new tunes from various youtube tutorials, so much easier than trying to work out from the written music, and I’m going to use this lovely 1939 edition, hardcover music book as an art book for abstract ideas - yes I’m going to paint and draw in it over the written notes and transform it into a new work of art.

The first marks are going to be the hardest, because I do feel a bit bad about defacing this beautifully preserved book, but I’m also recycling and repurposing it, so I shouldn’t feel too bad either.

I’m going to choose a page that’s a little in from the first pages so that I can relax and not worry about creating a fabulous first impression when someone opens the book to have a look.

My first entry -

On one page I put down some light grey gesso which I will paint over when it dries and on the other page I used paint, pen, collage and a sponge to make an abstract design. I may add some more to it when it’s dry… but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.

While that’s drying I shall get back to my commission…after I make a cup of tea and change out of my walking shoes which are a little damp from the beach walk I did earlier this morning…

…and post this weekly blog.

…a few hours later and I’m feeling pretty chuffed.

I picked up an unfinished…

June 24, 2022

…abstract and finished it today.

When I picked it up I intended to do some warm up painting before I continued working on a commissioned painting. I wanted to test a few colour mixes and because this abstract had been annoying me for many weeks, I picked it up not expecting to achieve anything much - it was one of those paintings that I kept working on and changing, turning upside down and rewriting…like first it was rocks in a landscape , then it was trees in a landscape, then some cows in a copse of trees, then a smaller cow on some rocks then a really big cow in front of a fence…kind-of-thing.

Anyway…for weeks and weeks it got nowhere. I was stuck. It didn’t matter that I was stuck because it wasn’t important. It was an ugly looking work, too dark, gloomy, messy, odd, unbalanced, confused. It wasn’t for anyone, not for any project or any purpose - but I kept going back to it, it was my in-between paintings painting. My little dumping ground….

But today I finished it. I got in a flow and finally found a path I could take out of the mess to make it work and it quickly came together. So I did just enough to complete it before I moved on to other work.

Done.

I’ll not touch it again except for the back…and to sign and date it…

…and find myself a new dumping ground.

I've spent the last few weeks…

June 16, 2022

…trying to be a bit more intuitive in my painting process. Letting an idea appear out of seemingly nowhere and applying that idea as quickly as possible to whatever it is I’m working on so I don’t over-think it too much. Once applied and concrete I can then think about it, assess what I’ve done and observe my reaction to it. The thinking about it after I’ve done it, and observing my reaction to it, is the key here because it stops me before the next idea can be applied which might obliterate the idea I just finished applying and actually quite liked for whatever reason.

It’s the opposite to life where we should think about what we are going to do before we do it, so as not to harm the things around us.

Painting, however, is the perfect place to deliberately inflict harm on the subject and then gently resolve it.

Sounds weirder than it actually is.

You can’t really paint something representational without thinking about it though. Like trying to paint a portrait with a good likeness to the subject while painting intuitively sounds like what an oxymoron should be, and maybe it is…unless that part of the painting process is automatic maybe? Like… you know it so well that you don’t have to think about it? “Unconscious competence” (big smile emoji) ….hmmmm… now I’m wondering if it is possible to drive intuitively…or is that more instinctively…you know, where you’re driving away, thinking about everything except the task at hand and get to your destination and you can’t remember all the details of how you actually got there. I know it’s not just me that does that.

hmmmm….now I’m wondering what’s the difference between instinctively and intuitively? (checking google)

-”instinct is something that is in you. A born behavior that is activated when you interact with certain triggers and stimuli. It is something that you can’t turn on and off. Your instinct is your protector factor. It controls your anxiety levels, your responses to new or unknown things, and the awareness of the moments that you need bold and brave.”

-”Your intuition is based on experiences and helps cultivate the “Myself” (the soul). Your intuition is fueled by life experiences, whether good or bad. It gives you the awareness of the pros and cons of a situation. It helps you create solutions or cause problems.”

ahhh, instinct is activated and intuition is cultivated.

maybe that means that you can develop your intuition.

What’s exciting for me now is that the painting process is getting more interesting the more I do it - and I do mean interesting, like there’s a million puzzles to be solved if I let them emerge out of the initial idea of their own accord - my intuition is “helping me cause problems and create solutions”.

I want to test...

June 8, 2022

…the strength of acrylic painting medium to see if it does what I think it does.

How I’m going to do this is add some medium to paint and make a transparent wash using very thin medium, I’ll then thin some more paint with water and compare them when they are dry - I also want to test thinned down paint with water then when that’s dry wash on the same medium over the top, so the medium dries on top of it not mixed in with it. When it’s all dry I can test the binding strength of each by scrubbing them with a wet brush and see if they hold.

Using the same paint I’ve made two squares of wash thinned with water and 1 square of wash thinned with medium (the middle one), and I notice that while they are wet they all look much the same.

perhaps there is a slight difference in how the brush marks are held in place with the medium but merge together a bit more with the water (like water paint).

Now I will give it some time to really dry and then brush some medium over the top of one of the watered down washes ( this is called sealing it), and then I’ll let it really dry overnight before I do the scrub test.

The results are this - the paint thinned with just water rubs off with a little effort, the paint thinned with medium needs a fair bit more effort to move the paint, but the paint sealed with medium doesn’t move at all with a hard scrub, which is a little surprising, but makes sense thinking about it.

Imagine the strength of paint thinned with medium then sealed with more of it - practically bullet proof!

a recorded the scrubbing part for the record.

and here’s a little story from my sketchbook.

Fat over lean…

June 1, 2022

…is paint speak for the principle in oil painting of applying paint with a higher oil content over paint with a lower oil content. This principal is important to follow if you want your paintings to “stand the test of time” and not crack because of uneven drying time. It’s not necessary to follow if you are playing around in your sketchbook, or similar, however.

What happens when you don’t follow the fat over lean principal is - as the painting slowly dries over many months, cracks might appear and this creates an unstable surface where moisture can get in, which can eventually cause the paint to flake and fall off.

don’t worry…

Many old oil paintings suffer from cracking, either fine and on the surface, or deeper cracks that go right down to the support, and the reasons as to why is not always clear. We do know that as oil paint cures it becomes less and less flexible, so more brittle and at the same time the support (canvas and possibly what it’s primed with) remains flexible, and the moment between the two can cause cracks in the more brittle surface paint. But these works are hundreds of years old, and if you’re playing around with oil painting today and one of those paintings is still around in a few hundred years time (destined to hang in a gallery or something), well…may as well let the restorers worry about any cracking problems that might pop up then. (big smile emoji)

The more oil in the paint the longer it takes to dry - actually oil doesn’t really dry, it cures, so if very oily paint (where pigment is mixed to transparency with a heavy oil medium) is layered down first and then painted over with a fast drying layer of paint mixed with solvent (solvent dries fast), or lean medium which dries faster than oily mediums but slower than solvent, the top layer dries much faster than what’s under it. When things dry they shrink. So if that fast drying shrinking layer is on top while the under layer is still trying to dry and so it’s slowly moving as it dries, this will cause the top layer to crack because it’s already dry and now that it’s dry it’s also inflexible. Inflexible dried paint can’t stretch with the movement of the drying paint that it’s sticking onto, so it cracks instead of stretching, breaking the seal.

This painting principal doesn’t apply to acrylic paint because acrylic mediums aren’t oily, are flexible when dry, they dry fast and they are binders (meaning they bind the paint together and to the surface. They are a kind of glue. However, thinning acrylic paint with water rather than medium does replace the binding strength with nothing (water evaporates), so very watered down paint that’s dried can easily be wiped off of the surface when brushing on the next layers of paint you put down if you’re not careful. Once the stronger top layers are dried however they bind with what’s underneath and that permanently fixes it.

So keeping these qualities of both oil and acrylic paint in mind, when using them together you should treat acrylic paint as lean, not fat. Also, because acrylic paint dries fast, doesn’t cure over months and is water soluble, it won’t stick to an oil painted surface. Think about it…what happens when you put water onto oil? It won’t sit on top, it won’t stick to it, so it pretty much falls off because it cant bind with the surface, the oil repeals water, and naturally wants to sit on the top.

Exceptions: there are some products that will convert an oil painted surface to accept acrylic paint and these are called universal primers. These are quality products that are designed for industrial and domestic interior and external cladding, and they do work over oil paintings too…and ofcourse you can always deliberately break the rules just to see what happens.

After writing this blog I thought I’d go around my home and see if any of my own oil paintings have started to crack - so far they are looking good and I can’t see any cracks.

and here’s a new oil painting that’s still drying…

Painting supports are...

May 27, 2022

…”any material onto which paint is applied.”

The most common supports are canvas, paper and board. Other, more exotic surfaces that artists paint on are metal, glass, linen, clay, plaster, porcelain, fibreglass and moulded plastics… …did I miss anything?

I usually paint on board, canvas and on paper in my sketchbooks.

Today I want to talk about boards - one of my favourite supports because they are sturdy, versatile, and can be inexpensive.

I like to keep on hand a stack of MDF (medium density fiberboard), pre-cut to size. The most economical way to do this is to buy a whole sheet from the local hardware store and have them cut it in store. Today I got myself 18 40x40cm squares out of 1 sheet and It cost me $7 to cut the $32 board up. That works out to around $2.20 a support.

I chose the 0.5cm thick board because I can put short staples straight into the back or very short screws to enable a means to hang without a frame. This board can be easily framed too if I choose to do that, and it’ll work with any kind of frame, with or without glass but it doesn’t need glass to cover it to protect it from damage when painted with acrylic and oil paint like paper does. It’s also strong and straight, doesn’t warp when painted on, is super smooth and paint sticks to it like glue, so it’s lovely to paint on, and…did I mention that it’s cheap?

I really enjoy preparing the boards, it’s therapeutic. I usually prepare 2 or 3 at a time. The prep turns into part of the painting process because I like to give them a bit of a rustic look with layers of paint and a bit of sanding around the edges, and I can get quite creative with this part of the process.

prep.

I like to give the boards a light sand around the edges and round off the corners which gives them an aged look.

I paint both sides…

and the edges with whatever acrylic paint I have laying around - sometimes I offload the paint left on my pallet from what I’ve been working on onto the boards - not much paint gets wasted around here.

Writing this blog made me think about whether MDF is environmentally friendly? Turns out that it can be because it can be made from recycled materials, and the most un-environmental thing about it is when it ends up in land fill. Hmmmm… One should look into buying discarded board from the salvage yard… …I wonder if they’d cut it up for me like the lovely people at Mitre 10 do without complaint.

I choose a side that I’ll paint on and give that side a few coats of gesso, sanding in-between coats. I like to pay particular attention to the edges, do I want them dark or light? Do I want lumps of paint making textured edges that I can sand back revealing the layers underneath? Do I want to make them an entirely different colour?

Sometimes I get a theme going and sometimes I’m more random as I do the prep. There’s already continuity in the size and shape, so I can rely on that if I want to team them up later for a group shot.

edges…

I like my edges to tell the story of the progress - when you can see the layers you can literally see time spent on prep which is why it looks a bit aged I guess. To me it looks interesting and rustic, especially when I use up bits of leftover paint - I can recall “that bit of paint was left over from that painting session…” Like a diary of painting time.

…several hours later…

I finished painting a portrait of Flynn for his birthday on that board that I under-painted with the two tones of grey (pictured above). I gave it to him last night and he seemed rather pleased :)

The Dark Side...

May 21, 2022

A few weeks ago Carrie asked me if I could write something about painting shadows.

I thought about it for a while - “what can I write about shadows that’s interesting and helpful and would condense into this blog space?”

As an idea started to form I primed some pages in my sketchbooks with white gesso.

Warm shadows.

It’s not uncommon to think of shadows when painting them as cooler kinds of colours than the parts that aren’t in the shadows - so when using colours in painting we might add black to the colour being used to make an illusion of a shadow, but even though black works it can easily end up looking dirty and dull, especially with skin tones.

…a few days later I’m ready to put my blog idea into practice… but first I need to clean up from a bit of abstract experimentation .

expressive abstract is so much fun and gives an opportunity to explore different aspects of the painting process without an end in mind, and it reveals a little bit about the inner workings of one’s mind too, I think.

Shadows:

My idea is to paint shadows of the same subject in different temperatures to compare them. I’m going to paint some noses and ears, using oils, with viridian green in my pallet because I’ve been meaning to play around with that again since my last exploration. I also bought myself a glass pallet so I want to use that for the first time too.

study 1.

This limited pallet works quite nicely for these reddish skin shadows in the ears I think, and the light pink tones would probably work for a nose - I’ll try that next.

Study 2.

Trying to be cooler in the shadows of this nose using the same pallet without gong too dark means I need to make soft greys rather than strong greens, browns or reds - so putting a little green into the light pink gives me a coolish grey shadow that’s not too dark.

now I’m going to try blue instead of green in my pallet to see what the cooler colour does to it.

study 3.

changing Viridian green for Ultramarine blue allows me to get more purple(ish) shadows than the warm shadows that green makes they are still warm shadows though, and where it gets cooler it gets greyer not necessarily darker.

It’s not a huge difference in temperature - both pallets make warm shadows which work with skin.

To get subtle tones in the shadow side it’s more about temperature than tone, so the tone is a similar key but the temperature (colour, more grey for cool and more red for warm) adds depth to the shadows.

So now I’m wondering if I need to cool my red down (Cad red mid is a very warm red) to see what happens to my shadows with a cooler red on the pallet.

What I will note though is that I’m not using black paint to make shadows, I’m using the three primaries and white to get the variations in tone and temperature, and some of these tones are very subtle.