just taking a few days off while the family loafs at grandma's and the house is as quiet as a mouse. time for reflection, reading*, guitar playing, and yes, even a new christmas painting! like me, I'm sure you've worried over the scarcity of good modern christmas paintings. this one, just finished last night, is 30" by 40" done in acrylic, pencil, tape, wrapping paper, Sharpie, and christmas bow on canvas. as you can see I'm having trouble lighting the wrapping paper correctly, this is the best I could do. I'm a newbie photog.
unlike my friend Sarah Webb who is an absolutely brilliant portraiture artist and who does everything perfectly right, I do everything wrong. I don't use an easel. I prefer to lay the paintings on the floor. nor do I have a palette. I like to mix the paints on a paper plate, then I can throw the plate away when I'm done! I've become adept at guessing how much paint to mix up.
one of painting's many mysteries is in the mixing of paints and the additives you use to create different paint effects. these are called mediums. the main reason I chose to work in acrylics is because of the mediums available. for example, the red part of this painting looks grainy. that's because I mixed a medium called "coarse pumice gel" with the red. the gray border has "flow aid" mixed in which helps to thin out the paint. and so on. it's so much fun. it's like being an alchemist.
and few things entertain me as much as shopping for paints and mediums.
*rob fetters sends me a great book to read each year for my birthday. this year's title is no exception, an engrossing account of the life of billionaire Warren Buffett.
Yes! Painting is a blast. The Christmas painting is very cool. Will a Christmas painting be a new tradition for you? Even though my regular medium is photography, and I'm a crappy painter, I like to pull out a canvas (or whatever is handy at the moment, like a chunk of cardboard or wood) every now and again. I like acrylics, too, but haven't tried mixing other stuff into the paints. I have one painting over my bed that I did years ago that I like, but don't think it's finished. Perhaps I'll get back to it one day.
ReplyDeleteEverybody else is reviewing themselves so I'm gonna review my an Adrian Belew Christmas with Julie Slick and Eric Slick.
ReplyDeleteIt rocked harder than a mofo-I'm going to do it again, you my friend are invited to attend the fun
i love working on the floor- something about an easel makes it boring and too academic- less creative and more formal
ReplyDeletegood work- I like how you haven't gone the cheesy xmas route- and the repetition of shapes really draws the eye in
ps: a cool thing to do if you like the no mess route is if you make alot of one colour you enjoy, put it in some cheap plastic containers, and put a dab of the colour on top of the lid- then it'll stay good for the time you work on it, and you wont worry about making the wrong colour if you want to fix a spot ;)
oh, and mediums are fun- same thing, make a ton of one colour and add stuff to each container- some cool punicey mediums can be done with junk found around the house/outside- have fun!