Busted

Bongo

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18"x18" oil on Nara paper.
Started this as an alla prima sketch using Perylene Black.. then it changed to a wet-on-wet experiment just using:
Titanium white
Titanium Buff
Phthalo Blue
Cad Yellow
Cad Orange
Perylene Black

Bust full.jpg


comments welcomed
 
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One looks sad and one looks mad, or are those their poker faces? ;) I like it. ❤️
 
looks like they lost what they couldn't afford to lose .. sad disease: gambling. Good protrayal of loss.
 
Nara is a polypropylene "paper" similar to Yupo but different. It's made to be used with alcohol inks and makes no claims (or disclaims) to work with oil or acrylic. Lovely surface to paint on but has mixed results with permeability. Amazon had a two-for-one sell so on a whim I got two 40" x 16.5' rolls! That's 33feet of 40" wide paper!! I've gone thru one roll and still can't decide if it's going to work for me or not.

I think of this forum as a workshop rather than a showcase. I'm trying to not noodle - that is overly correct details. The sketch came out good so I wanted to colorize it. But on Nara you have to use relatively thick paint - and the sketch had no background so I had to come up with something on the fly. The playing cards were too wide in the sketch, so I made them narrower in the painting which left them too small but ...charming?

Here I think is a better solution - also gets rid of some of the annoying background and adds some mystery.

18" x 12" oil on Nara

Bust 12x18.jpg
 
Well this painting has been an education for me, Bongo. Nara paper sounds interesting. It must be kind of fun to work on such a different surface - and so much of it! I knew there is Perylene red but never heard of black. What’s it like compared to the usual blacks? I like the expressions on the faces of your card players and the implied story and think the crop works well.
 
Thanks Donna.

Perylene Black is transparent and goes deep green when thinned. As far as I know, only Winsor and Newton carry it.

Nara has curl memory. So when you cut off a piece from the roll, it curls back up -- tried putting weights overnight, etc. The only thing that worked was to rewind the roll in the reverse direction onto another spool then let it sit for a couple weeks.
 
Still showcasing but showcasing your ideals and not ideals that you think will please the audience.
If I knew what would please an audience I'd go into overdrive making it. Everyone says they don't make art to please an audience,.
but who the hell knows what pleases? By please I don't mean likes on Instagram, I mean sales. So I make art to please myself because I don't have the foggiest idea how to please anyone else.

I also believe there is an audience out there (yet to be found) for my stuff, because I'm not unique I'm not that special, I'm not a misunderstood genius that will take a century for the plebes to catch up with me.

If you did how to make art that sells, there's nothing keeping you from also making stuff that doesn't sell.
 
You have a broader explanation of showcasing than I. To me showcasing is simply showing. Things get so easily misunderstood when it comes to words. Blame on on babble...we speak the same language but it's foreign to each ear.
 
I like seeing the cards, but agree with your decision to crop out the very top. I was looking at the play cards and thought your title referenced the subtle suit patterns, as if busted on having duplicates up their sleeves. We don't see the expression of the player behind the front cards, but the other players look a mite...frozen. :LOL:

It's really well done!
 
I very much like this crop too. It's a very good painting, I like the story, and love the facial expressions.
 
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