Painting #34

Here is my painting number 34.

#34, May 2016 (Oil on Canvas on Panel, 10 x 8 inches)

This somewhat abstract and romantic coloured painting was based on a much larger acrylic painting (photo below) which I quite liked but did not seem to really excite my family (my primary audience).

Painting #33

Here is my painting number 33:

#33, May 2016 (45 x 25.5 cm)

The idea for this painting was basically a dappled sky such as that shown in my source photo (below).

Painting #32

I woke up this morning eager to start a day of painting, but found that – in the cold and wet weather – all the paintings I had primed or applied an imprimatura to over the past two days were still wet! So I spent the day preparing more panels, and in the afternoon I did this watercolour:

#32 Watercolour, May 2016 (A4 size)

The source photo for this painting is not my own, and has a somewhat interesting story:

Field of Boundless Emptiness

I have been quite busy at work, and at night amidst pouring rain in my dark, leaky, beautiful studio I work to prepare panels for the weekend ahead. So no new paintings to post. I am scraping the bottom of the barrel and posting an acrylic painting I made during my brief foray into acrylics last year.

Invented Landscape, 2015 (Acrylic on Canvas, approx. 61 x 61 cm)

As I noted in an an earlier post, I struggled with certain aspects of acrylics, and now I only have six surviving acrylics, and the above is one of them. I have always been attracted by the idea of a thin line of water reflecting an evening sky, leading the eye to a field beyond – a field of boundless emptiness.

Painting #31 Take 2

Here is my painting #31 reworked. I did not like the happy colours – to me it lacked the depth I was seeking for. There were also some patterns that I felt lead the eye away from the centre of interest.

#31 Reworked, May 2016 (Oil on Canvas on Panel, 30 x 32 cm)

To me, the painting now, with several layers of transparent colour, is more lustrous and conveys some of the depth I was seeking. I realize this may not be in everyone’s taste, but tonight I feel quite happy with it – however, ask me again tomorrow and I might say something different!

Outside the Walls

Tonight I cut three large panels and put a first coat of Gesso on them. No works in progress but some ideas in the mind. So tonight I share with you an old watercolour quite dear to my heart.

This watercolour represents the view from our farmhouse when we lived in South Africa. I have always liked how the zig-zag composition leads the eye into that far blue space. I recall looking at this view day after day, and always thought of Rilke’s poem (below) in inverted format: the landscape waits like a besieging army. 

Painting #31

Here is painting #31.

Despite what I said in earlier posts about my enjoyment of the painting process, all I could think of as I painted this was the starting lines of Rilke’s poem “Pushing Through”:

“Vielleicht, dass ich durch schwere Berge gehe in harten Adern, wie ein Erz allein;” (translation by Robert Bly below).

Painting #30

This is my 30th painting since I started painting again:

#30 Oil on Canvas on Panel. Approximately 10 x 8 inches

I showed the underpainting in my previous post, but here it is again below. Since I feel like I am in a bit of a rut, I thought to take it easy and just make a copy of my Painting #11, which I showed in this post.

Painting #29

I really struggled with this one, mainly because of my attitude. I need to take a few days off, look at some things that inspire me, rest. Then wait for the tide to come in again.

#29 Invented Landscape (Oil on Canvas on Panel, 10 x 8 inches)

As you can see from the underpainting (below), the final image is very different from the original idea. Instead of the tree in the foreground I just left a single, small but sharp reflection to slow down the movement into space.

Painting #28

Feeling a bit under the weather, and resolved to slow down after I spent several nights of the past week painting into the night. This afternoon I did one underpainting for a landscape, and was going to stop there. But I hovered around in the studio – always a slippery slope – and in the end I managed to start and finish this abstract:

#28 Abstract (Oil on Canvas Panel, 30 x 32 cm)

On my computer screen this looks too yellow – a bit garish. But on my iPad the correct colour and value comes through.

I seldom work up the courage to try an abstract painting, but I was encouraged by a comment by the super-creative Debi Riley on my watercolour painting shown in this post to try my hand at it again. This is my first painting on canvas in a long time – the last time I tried I gave up in disgust with myself and the way the canvas accepts paint (probably because I was comparing the experience to watercolour).