What are you working on?
- Thread starter Artyczar
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stlukesguild
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Well... at least my dogs don't sit on my paintings... although the little one (Raphael) comes up to the studio every time I'm working and wants me to stop whatever I'm doing and come downstairs with the rest of the family.
If I don't pay attention in a timely manner, he'll start climbing up my leg:
If I don't pay attention in a timely manner, he'll start climbing up my leg:
Iain
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john
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Aww Rafael is cute.
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I'm working on this. It's worse than a failed painting. It used to be a decent painting and then I decided to "improve it", which mushed it into some blah blurry mess. I don't know what I was thinking.
So the plan is to attack it with a knife. A pallet knife. I've been watching this guy on YT .....RICHARD MUSGRAVE-EVANS https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJLrCc_o9Pc0pvyw7y7VX5A all he uses is a knife.
I like his blend of mark making, abstraction and landscape. Up close it's about the paint and step back and it gets real. For now at least I like the look. It's a little commercial I suppose but for plein air it sure gets a study done quickly. He gets a large painting finished in an hour. The immediacy is amazing.
I'll post this here as a "before" to help as motivation and to keep my feet to the fire. I want you all to yell at me if I don't do something. Like tomorrow.
The plan is to use this as a rough base, but it will get completely covered. It's only a 14 x 10 ? I'm going to try to copy what Richard is doing. I suspect that will be harder than it looks. I've barely ever used a painting knife.
****************************************
I'm working on this. It's worse than a failed painting. It used to be a decent painting and then I decided to "improve it", which mushed it into some blah blurry mess. I don't know what I was thinking.
So the plan is to attack it with a knife. A pallet knife. I've been watching this guy on YT .....RICHARD MUSGRAVE-EVANS https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJLrCc_o9Pc0pvyw7y7VX5A all he uses is a knife.
I like his blend of mark making, abstraction and landscape. Up close it's about the paint and step back and it gets real. For now at least I like the look. It's a little commercial I suppose but for plein air it sure gets a study done quickly. He gets a large painting finished in an hour. The immediacy is amazing.
I'll post this here as a "before" to help as motivation and to keep my feet to the fire. I want you all to yell at me if I don't do something. Like tomorrow.
The plan is to use this as a rough base, but it will get completely covered. It's only a 14 x 10 ? I'm going to try to copy what Richard is doing. I suspect that will be harder than it looks. I've barely ever used a painting knife.
OliveOyl
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Well, good luck with the knife and please don’t hurt yourself! Your guy’s work looks complicated (to me) but then again...I’ve never painted with a knife either.
However lately...I’ve been looking at artists who paint the figure in very chunky and simplified forms...like Picasso’s “Three Graces” and lots of Felice Casorati and even Diego Rivera’s stocky peasant people. I want to learn how to make my figures less detailed and more architectural and cubist-looking so they’re like solid blocks of concrete. And so in my nosing around, I stumbled on Teacher-Painter CATHERINE KEHOE who also does knife work. Or is it brush work? I can’t even tell (yet) but I’ll happily read more later, and the essays especially look interesting. For me, her work might be an “easy study” and so maybe something will get through my thick - or obsessively tangled - head. Maybe it’s all about analyzing a section of what you’re looking at and then quickly, “writing” it down with the knife as some kind of colored plane (or shaped form.)
Haha. Surely, the palette people are scoffing at me.
*shrug*
However lately...I’ve been looking at artists who paint the figure in very chunky and simplified forms...like Picasso’s “Three Graces” and lots of Felice Casorati and even Diego Rivera’s stocky peasant people. I want to learn how to make my figures less detailed and more architectural and cubist-looking so they’re like solid blocks of concrete. And so in my nosing around, I stumbled on Teacher-Painter CATHERINE KEHOE who also does knife work. Or is it brush work? I can’t even tell (yet) but I’ll happily read more later, and the essays especially look interesting. For me, her work might be an “easy study” and so maybe something will get through my thick - or obsessively tangled - head. Maybe it’s all about analyzing a section of what you’re looking at and then quickly, “writing” it down with the knife as some kind of colored plane (or shaped form.)
Haha. Surely, the palette people are scoffing at me.
*shrug*
stlukesguild
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With Winter Break finally here I am able to spend some time in the studio working on the painting I began in June or July. The matte acrylic black on the raven or crow looked like a black hole in the painting so I went over it with a very dark Navy Blue. I then realized that the blackberries just weren't dark enough so I went over them with the same navy blue and then repainted all of them. I'm almost done with the top. The bird will take the longest and I plan on a simplified rendering... not a lot of detail... as that is not the focal point. By tomorrow or Tuesday, I'll raise the painting up and begin to work on the hair and her torso. I have a number of ideas but we'll see which one pans out.
john
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Well I tried following along with that YT video by that guy from Australia with the huge paintings and the big painting knife. Somewhere between what he was doing, what was on my panel already and what I thought things should look like, with no good reference for any of those things, I ended up with this.
I stayed with the knife until I got to the dune grass. At that point I cheated and went with a fan brush. So the foreground which was supposed be "chunky" according to Rich, ended up smooth and the clouds which are supposed to be smooth, ended up chunky. Using a knife is, different. I should have worn gloves. I made a mess.
I was following this video of a 4 foot by 3 foot painting? He does this in an hour and a half.
But I did this. 10 x 13 inch. That abstraction thing is so elusive and you would never know I used a knife here. The cubism never showed up. Maybe I don't want square sand after all.
I stayed with the knife until I got to the dune grass. At that point I cheated and went with a fan brush. So the foreground which was supposed be "chunky" according to Rich, ended up smooth and the clouds which are supposed to be smooth, ended up chunky. Using a knife is, different. I should have worn gloves. I made a mess.
I was following this video of a 4 foot by 3 foot painting? He does this in an hour and a half.
But I did this. 10 x 13 inch. That abstraction thing is so elusive and you would never know I used a knife here. The cubism never showed up. Maybe I don't want square sand after all.
Artyczar
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Great work SLG!
John, What you've done is really impressive. I say this you you as much as to myself that it doesn't matter how fast someone else can accomplish their work. It always takes as long as it takes. Plus you're talking about someone who has been doing their own technique all along. It's sure it's like second nature to them. I especially love the second piece
John, What you've done is really impressive. I say this you you as much as to myself that it doesn't matter how fast someone else can accomplish their work. It always takes as long as it takes. Plus you're talking about someone who has been doing their own technique all along. It's sure it's like second nature to them. I especially love the second piece
