Tag: Painting

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Reflections on the Final Show

I have researched and tested a great number of possible platforms for the final show. Unfortunately, I have found them quite disappointing. The most common concept is to based on echoing a feeling of a physical gallery. Frequently, the software is very slow and clumsy in operation. Additionally, the overall effect is more focused on the look of the space rather than the work itself. Art becomes somehow secondary to the meaningless decorations and textures of walls, ceiling and the lighting.

The most popular online gallery is artsteps.com and https://www.furioos.com/ is best for streaming 3D work.

Other options, which are worth investigating are:

https://www.capterra.com/art-gallery-software/

https://www.3dvas.com/

http://omeka.org/

http://openexhibits.org/

http://collectiveaccess.org/

http://pachyderm.nmc.org

5 Free and Open Source Tools for Creating Digital Exhibitions

Alternatively, I have considered using a website, which is similar in design to behance.net.

I really like the simplicity, effectiveness and freshness of the front page. There is a grid of large block images, which is inviting and very clear. This website is able to accommodate a broad range of artefacts, including gifs files and video work. Photography on display is relatively high resolution and organised with order and structure.

Our group meets in Zoom on a regular bases to discuss possibilities for arranging the exhibition. All students are very proud and would like to present their research projects to the best of the abilities. Likely, Aristotle, who is one of our students, has offered to help everyone and donated both, his time and the use of his original software.

In preparation for my exhibition, I have carefully considered a range of ideas. My main intention is to make sure that the way, in which my work is displays reinforces its meaning. I would like to avoid using any unnecessary gimmicks and distractions.

In these unprecedented times, it is quite strange for a painter to accept that the final exhibition will not have a physical dimension. Frankly, I am saddened and overwhelmed by a lack of reality it terms of the experience of true colour, texture and painterly mastery of strokes. However, an artist and creative individual needs to seek opportunities in overcoming obstacles. Therefore, my intention is to excel myself and make the online exhibition even better, more refined and sophisticated. I would like for this to be a new learning curve full of controlled happy accidents, experimentation and deep reflection of what is appropriate in term of visual communication – my chosen language of expression.

The digital approach creates a new chance to experiment with a ‘space’, which supports and reinforces my messages in cohesion to deliver a holistic poetry about my painterly and video work.

Currently, I am planing for a long wall with three parallel and simultaneous video projections. This number can be possibly extended to four. I am in the process of working on a painting titled ‘Ravens and Crows Will Peck Us to Pieces’. It is quite likely that I will make sufficient progress to video another washing cycle. This image is different to portraiture. Therefore, I was relatively hesitant to include this image. However, on reflection, it summarises my overall responses to my research findings in a time of lockdown and social isolation. We are all subjected to mortality, vulnerable and fragile. The end of our journey is the only certainty in our lives. Death is the culmination of our waiting, while being suspended in the vacuum of hypnotic repetition.

The side walls of the gallery will be dedicated to the display of the actual paintings. I should be able to exhibit between 8 and 10 canvasses.

It is all very exciting!

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Zealous Portfolio Challenge

I have spent the whole day preparing my submission to this fantastic opportunity created by Zealous. Their aim is to motivate artists to review their practice in the time of crisis.  As a reward, selected three winners will receive a portfolio review from industry professional, David Ferry, who is the President of the The Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers.

Additionally, unsuccessful entries will receive another chance to reflect on their work. Zealous offer to arrange a comprehensive system of Peer-to-Peer Reviews.

I have thoroughly enjoyed the process of organising my portfolio online using their platform. Currently, I am nervously awaiting to hear back from the organiosors.

My confirmation email is below:

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Ravens and Crows Will Peck Us to Pieces – Painting Progress

I have gone through a long journey Exploration, trial and error with this piece. Initial observational and crude sketches of crows in hard pencil, were gradually transformed into dynamic and terrifying black silhouettes of individual birds in a herd. There is definitely something raw about this piece, which portrays a bizarre world with no source of light nor gravity. The mood is overpowering and depressing, perhaps overwhelmed by dirty browns and broken yellows. My painting echoes achievements of strange yet famous Munich grave painters, who limited their palette to the use of dirty colours and broken chroma. This was the main discovery of and I have decided to refer to their learning on the composition on my experimental composition.

Initially, I collaged a self portrait into the painterly space. I have carefully chosen this photo to make sure that it was personal Ly significant. Subsequently, I immersed myself in the creation of an arrangement, which contained energy and drama. Through scraping, glazing and overlaying, I managed to increase the element of a secret atmosphere, mood and, therefore, forced a reflection on a viewer.

The sipping light through the colour layers will later become subdued. I will use an overall glaze of a mixture of crimson Alizarin and Prussian blue. I will also consider using an oil based coat in order to ensure that there is an appropriate translucency and depth of the overlaying colour.

The final stage will be concerned with scrapping of the glaze and, perhaps, imprinting further textures into the existing layers to reveal a mysterious illusions of secrets underneath.

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When Will I See You Again?

This is the last photograph of my current piece. I had no option, but to leave it to dry. The new layers of paint and ink need time to settle down and cure.

I am feeling a sense of loss and sadness. The most annoying paradox is that now, in social isolation, I have an ocean of time to paint and produce exciting work. However, it is very difficult to transport my work between my studio and home.

There is a great similarity between the Thai Masseur and I, a sense of parity of our situation. Perhaps, the title of this piece describes it best:

Not Working, Only Waiting…

When will I see you again?

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Bye Bye Burmese Monks

I have made some real progress today. I set up a video recording session of the washing of the Three Burmese Monks piece. Everything was arranged in the print room. As the DLSR run out of power, I had to result to using my iPhone XSMax with a tripod.

Following a discussion of details included in my storyboard, Georgie, our technician, agreed to help with the washing performance.

My picture frame was purposely wanky and crocked. I wanted to include a glimpse of a fire extinguisher and PVC pipes in the view. I also thought that bleeding stains on dirty floor make a valuable contribution to the overall impact of captured images, their meaning and the recording.

The raw footage is relatively long and full of accidental disruptions. They will all need to be edited out in order to create a cohesive video piece. The details of my plan will emerge soon, and continue to evolve and grow.

I enclose the final washed up image of the Three Burmese Monks piece and some raw and culminate footage below:

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New Face

Following a long period of consideration and reflection, I have restarted work today on the Thai Masseur piece.

The main issue was to complete painting the face. On the one hand, I wanted for the portrait to be recognisable, on the other, I have struggled with solving a number of ethical issues regarding a possible reaction and rejection of my work by the model. I experienced this kind of a situation with one of the former pieces. Subsequently, this unpleasant episode had let to the destruction of my own work and several alterations to other experiments.

My new idea is inspired by deeply glazed and moody flemish paintings. I am especially inspired by Metsu and his self portrait. He positioned himself inside a window arch. This implies a composition within a composition. I am also using a double rectangular. My creative intention is to achieve a sense of ambiguity while drawing all attention to the centre – on the masseur. I want to rely on a visual suggestion of portraiture rather than a descriptive portrayal of a woman. The plan is to leave her facial features undefined, like a ghostly outline of what is really there.

https://www.rct.uk/collection/405943/a-self-portrait

GABRIEL METSU (LEIDEN 1629-AMSTERDAM 1667)

A Self-Portrait c.1655-8 Oil on panel | 37.7 x 31.4 cm (support, canvas/panel/str external) | RCIN 405943

To give the surface more vibrancy, I used water solvable oil pastels. ‘Dancing’ with a crayon on top of the painting allows me to achieve a sense of mystery – secret light, which brings out parts of the skull and the jaw – all in the dusk of the space portrayed.

The next stage of the painting process will be to glaze the overall piece with a variety of transparent layers of an acrylic medium, perhaps combined with some watered down PVA glue. This is to prepare the surface for the overprinting stage using the silk screen technique and enhance a feeling of unity between the different formal elements and parts of the composition.

I have already prepared a new pattern based on decorative elements, which I have isolated from the interior of the massage salon. I will use this design to create a random over-image. This, in turn, will have a dual function. The first is to help to engage the centre in the overall painterly illusion. The second aim is to increase the amount of detail and enhance holistic and expressive qualities of my piece.

At this stage, I am considering using a range of gold and crimson tones. This initial plan might be subsequently altered in favour of a more spontaneous and instinctive decisions and reflections in action.

I am enclosing photographs of the final stages of work today and a close up of the ‘New Face’

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Andrew Gadd at Art Number 23

I have finally organised to collect Burmese Captain from an exhibition at the Old Biscuit Factory. I am so pleased to have recovered this piece.

At the same time, I got a chance to preview a new exhibition of large scale dramatic paintings by Andrew Gadd. He studied at Falmouth and the Royal Academy of Art. His paintings resemble a combination of war inspired pieces from the Renaissance and Russian romanticism in painting.

I include a selection of his work below:

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Screen-Printing Workshop

To diversify my experiences from last year with mono-printing and etching, I opted for screen-printing.

Following an excellent presentation of technical possibilities, we reviewed an extensive range of examples of prints, covering numerous pieces produced by both, staff and students.

Tony Lee delivered a detailed demonstration of a variety of processes, while discussing alternatives to the time-typical practice. To my surprise, he also gave me all of my prints from last year’s workshop. I was astonished by this amazing surprise! Thank you Tony.

Brian Whitewick introduces us to the technical aspects of coating and developing screens. His knowledge and experience were excellent.

With his help, I was able able to achieve a crisp transfer of my images onto a silk screen.

Initially, I taped a screen and established a form of registration. I used a number of experimental techniques including masking, drizzling and flicking. I dragged the squeegee across and continuously overprinted my under-images with countless layers of harmonious colour transparencies. My creative intention was to achieve a sense of depth of colour and sensitivities of related textures. Subsequently, I used the same images as for the cyanotype workshop and developed both of the on the same screen.

Background colour considerations:

Using the screen, I overprinted the backgrounds using a similar range of techniques and ideas. Here again, my intention was to achieve effects of mysterious ambiguity, which forces viewers to interpret rather than read images. I was particularly intrigued by electric properties of a bright pink ink, when combined with rich and deep blues, and subdued yellows.
My final experimentation and printmaking proposals, which I subsequently developed, are dynamic and full of healthy curiosity of the painterly space. The subject matter is visually suggested and not described. When dry, I will continue to work with these prints to refine them and enhance their colour further through a range of digital processes , possibly extending to stop frame animation.
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Thai Masseur – Recent Progress

I have made some progress with my recent piece.  The key focus was to start gradually building up a range of colour layers with sensitivity.  I tried to avoid loosing a diversity of previously created marks and accidental stains.  However, due to the fact that my spin paintings were executed using diluted gloss paints, the saturation of the background composition was very low.  I did not have enough paint to achieve a deeper and richer colour compositions on the circular patches.  Subsequently, I have created a distinct rectangular window within my canvas. This is an obvious problem and I am faced with a disjointed and incohesive piece.

In order to solve this, I have identified a dynamic part of the background composition and isolated a section from the bottom, right hand corner.  The idea was to open this image in Photoshop and manipulate it sufficiently to develop a strong and contrasting idea for a new silk screen.  This pattern like ‘splash’ will be used  for partial overprinting of the background painting , hopefully achieving a greater sense of a holistic flow.  I will also try to pick up vibrant crimsons and Prussian blues to increase the overall energy of the piece and, therefore, its impact.

Additionally, I will need to work much more carefully and precisely on the painting itself to bring out more detail to the hands of the masseur and the feet of the model. They too flat and appear to have lost some of their form.

The Thai masseur would also benefit from a more pictorial description of her face.  However, this will happen at a later stage.

I am considering glazing the piece with a diluted solution of a medium and allowing it to dry before returning to the printing process next week. I also need more time to develop my ideas for the screen further.

Black and white proposal for a transfer onto screen.

IMG_6757

Dynamic section isolated from the background.

IMG_6757

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Thai Masseur

In result of reviewing sign paintings by Hirst, I have experimented with a range of simple spin paintings.  I attached circles of unprimed canvas to an electric wheel in ceramics. I immersed myself in a child-like play pouring diluted gloss paints onto the spinning surface, regulating the speed with a foot pedal.

The next stage was concerned with arranging a suitable composition using a variety circular spin paintings.  I thought that the circular motion resembled a rotating image in a bull-eye window of a washing machine.  When I achieved an appropriate layout, I pasted the entire thing together using a solution of diluted PVA glue.

The underage was dramatic, dynamic and vibrant.  Simultaneously, it contained a diverse range of colours, textures and expressive smudges.  This created a perfect environment for the painting stage.  I focused an an ambiguous portrayal of a foot masseur from Pattaya, entrapped in a repetitive routine and bored with the activity.

There is a number of holes in the painted surface, through which, the background is visible.  I felt that this blending and effect of superimposure, enhanced an overwhelming character and feel of the composition.

The next stage of work will include bringing the image out by very gradual process of building colour on top of the surface with water soluble pastels.  Hopefully, the impasto will become sufficiently thick to increase a sensation of weight in this piece.

Although, I would like to achieve a sense of openness to interpretation, I would like create more focus on the hands and their smoothing function and symbolic meaning of, which is associated with a touch.

I am really excited to have started to explore a new possibility while extending on my current development of both: conceptual thinking and technical methodology.

Additionally, this painting is on a very large scale stretched canvas, perhaps the biggest piece I have approached since starting this project.

Dimensions:

115 X 184 cm

IMG_6707

 

 

IMG_6717 2

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Spin!

I came across the first series of spin paintings by Damien Hirst in the early 90s. I learned about this experiments, when he first started to explore a range of possibilities using this technique in 1992 and extending on alternatives by employing the idea of a stencil.

In addition to their powerful colours, patterns and textures, they were frequently composed on circular formats. I was touched by a great similarity between the look and feel of these works and my ideas concerned with recording the spinning cycle through a bullseye circular window of a washing machine.

On reflection, I came to a conclusion that his famous spin paintings were very influential in forming my new ideas for a series of images.

The spinning motion is monotonous, repetitive and echoes the nature of what I am trying to portray and question in my project.

I include a collage based on his various work below: