What are you working on?

[Artyczar]

Thank you Artyczar. What I posted is the finished half. The other half of the page is blank. I cannot seem to draw the structure then add colour. I need to do it as I go. If i didn't, it feels like I would lack the belief, drive, or something.

Everyone has their process. I like yours.

 

[Iain]

Can you tell what this is made from?

 

[Nufocus]

Wow Iain! I like that!

 

[brianvds]

One of my occasional forays into cartooning, meant in jest and hopefully not too offensive to anyone...

 

[Artyczar]

Iain, I like it, but I give up. What's it made from?

 

[Iain]

Ballpoint pen.

 

[ntl]

While waiting for paint to dry on one, I decided to update another oil painting, and then
I got out both watercolors and the few gouache tubes I have. So kind of just playing around,
working to learn some things at the same time.

 

[Claude J Greengrass]

Can you tell what this is made from?

Oil sticks or Oil pastels or it might be plain ordinary crayons.

 

[Iain]

Correct, there is Oil pastel, as well the pen.

 

[Artyczar]

I've been working on a Xmas card for my friend today (a watercolor and ink), but part of it got ruined because I painted the back in green acrylic and it seeped through along the sides on the front.

I'm using it anyway though. Maybe I'll finish it later or tomorrow.

 

[Iain]

I bet that doesn't get thrown out in the New Year. Dan with antlers and a red nose...

My daughter's mother received a card from her colleague's child. Rudolph realising it's time...

 

[Iain]

Poor Rudi You don't know how reindeer suffer for children.

 

[john]

I'm going to start painting any day now. I'm either going to finish one of the four paintings needing finishing, start a new painting which I have ten ideas for, or do something painting related like thinking about getting started painting. I mean it. As soon as I decide.

It's like diving in a cold pool isn't it? Takes some nerve but once in the water it becomes all right. In fact it can consume you, which is why we are afraid of jumping in. It's a little uncomfortable, but exhilarating.

I think I need to just intentionally paint something bad. Slap some damn paint around. It's just damn paint. Dammit. Take the onus off that it has to be perfect. Maybe some ab-ex mess with elements of crude un-realism. An angry figurative cubist landscape done in folk acid art brut style and surrealistic abstraction. I've always wanted to do one of those.

You guys ever find it difficult/scary to get painting?

 

[OliveOyl]

No.

What’s there to be scared of? I think the very best part of painting is the jumping in and ruining a perfectly good pristine canvas. Especially after all that friggin time inside my mind...thinking, thinking, thinking, planning, pondering, designing, imagining, researching, editing. My head reaches explosion and so when I finally dump it all out...it’s a good and satisfying “release.”

(Notice it’s all in my head. Nothing in my heart. She’s dead inside, I hear.)

Then the “painting work” begins and it drags on and on, day after day, all the way to the bitter end (no matter what!) until I go on to the next one, like a robot. It‘s like I’m just floating along in a sea of utter painting boredom, which more importantly, keeps the boredom of real life away.

Obviously, I have my own peculiar set of fears...

 

[Nufocus]

Well, been working a bit on this one..... I think it may be finished now. It’s somewhat surrealistic, even if that was not the intention. It’s acrylics on this funny kind of paper that’s hard to work on (can’t remember where the hell it came from).
We

have had Pembroke Corgis in the family for years. Nothing to do with Her Majesty, honestly!

 

[ntl]

I love these paintings. I wonder if I'm on the wrong track.

 

[snoball]

My favorite breed of dog (also has nothing to do with Her Majesty), I recognized immediately that it was a Corgi. Oh the painting is great too as well as the dog. That funny kind of paper adds to the ambiance.

 

[Iain]

As much as I liked the previous work, I think this is my favourite subject of your work to date. Through your style, your subjects have a way of capturing the imagination.

I was surprised when i heard that corgis were working dogs and originally bred to herd cattle. The little whippersnappers!

It is nice to see the deferential use of capital letters when speaking of our beloved monarch.

 

[Artyczar]

John, I can relate to the jumping into the cold pool feeling. You're not alone. Have you ever read Art & Fear? It's a super short read it can be helpful for some. It has helped me before and I read it every now and again. You can get stuck in your head and get frozen in fear and not start, but once you get started, the fear will leave, I promise you. Just get to work and it will all work out.

 

[Nufocus]

Hey Sno, such a great breed, ain’t they?....
Thank you kindly.
Iain, how nice of you!! Greatly appreciated! And for Elizabeth, we must show some respect! Don’t we?...