Paint like a child....

Paint like a child....

Monday past, I spend a very productive day at The Learning Connexion (TLC) in Lower Hutt, Wellington.  It was interesting to spend time in a classroom environment with my tutor (Gary Freemantle) and other on site students. Feedback and interaction is freely used in the class and have sparked a few ideas that will hopefully serve as inspiration for future works of art.

I started the day off with strong colours and large paint brushes trying to paint without thinking about what I am doing - just doing shapes, lines, patterns. Like a child would, without any inhibitions.

This proved to be more difficult than what I thought. It is amazing how a trained mind want to force you to behave in a certain way, i.e. I like to be in control of my paintbrush/paint. Painting like a child is not like that. Eventually I let go and at the end of the day I liked the outcome. I poured, splattered and rubbed the paint with my fingers.  I definitely want to develop painting faces (abstract and otherwise) with dripping and running paint.

Below here are the work I did on this classroom day. It is in no particular order.

Natural Cycles

I watched a program on Discovery channel about the birth and death of a star, maybe our sun? I thought that might be a good follow on from the theme of MY BEAUTIFUL EARTH SERIES. 

The idea about this was that the star will become bigger and bigger as time passes. It will consume everything in its path when this happens, e.g. it will consume earth. 

(I know it sounds very doomsday!!!)

It will eventually explode due to the forming of certain metals, minerals and chemicals as it expands. When that happens it will leave a supernova in its place (and maybe even a black hole…..), but the end result is that it will be the beginning of something new.

Something like the reverse or start of what we believe when we are saying “from dust to dust”, as all the building blocks of our bodies can be found out there after the explosion took place.

 This process can take as long as millions of years and is not easy to understand by humans.

 I foresee that this series will consist out of 8 paintings, 24 x 24, acrylic on canvas.

Painting 1 - Blissfully unaware

To make this painting I used very little intervention from my paintbrush. Most of the colours and patterns were made by dripping or pouring the paint onto the canvas and then picking the canvas up and moving it around. E.g. tilting it for the straight lines and turning it from side to side for the other patterns. I filled the insides of the buildings in by dripping paint into the spaces in between the paint runs and letting the paint mix at free will to make new colours and patterns. This is a very wet method to work with and need patience. if you put the next layer on too quickly you can easily land up with brown!

Painting 1 Painting 1 Start and below Work in progress  

Painting 1 Final

I like this. It's vibrant, colourful and exactly how I intended it to be. It is also more interesting than painting 2. At this stage I do not contemplate adding anything else to the painting, but I will wait until it is completely dry to see what happens.

Painting 2 -"It seems OK"  - working Painting 20 x 20

Painting 2 is still very much in progress. This is the working painting on 20x20 size canvas. I am experimenting with colours and composition. I do think that it might end up similar to painting1 and that the flowers might just be changing colour - not so pink but a bit more brown. The sky will probably include some darker or grey clouds. The final painting will be done on 24 x 24 canvas with acrylic paint.

Painting 3 - Progress? - Working Painting 20 x 20

In my mind I had a visual picture of how I would like this painting 3 to look like. It had to be much more free than painting 2. I had to revert to let the paint do the work and not force the paintbrush to make lines that I thought should be represented from the working drawings. I did exactly that and I was surprised. I did many different layers of wet on wet and then when it was all dried I put thicker paint on, which which was not painted, but instead I moved the canvas around to get the desired effect.

I liked this a lot and was inspired to start with the painting 3 which will be showed at the exhibition. In the end, I might include this one as well. Size 20 x 20 Acrylic on canvas.

Lena Delta in Russia

MY BEAUTIFUL EARTH SERIES

My thinking behind doing this series is the following: There are so many views , ideas, facts, myths etc around global warming as well as what is causing it and how it is affecting earth as well as what will happen to earth eventually.

With this series of paintings I will ask the question as to are we responsible for the so-called doomed future of earth or are we just caught up in a time on earth where this was bound to happen? 

Riyadh Saudi Arabia

My paintings will show for e.g. the Yemen Wadi, which today is a desert like place with a little water and vast uninhabitable space, but in times gone by, thousands of years ago, it was a lush river with great forests. I am asking where did it go?  In those times I can not imagine “global warming” played a significant part in changing the landscape.

I will aim to let the viewer decide what the answer is.  Other paintings, e.g. the Lena Delta in Russia, I will include because I like it and it is beautiful and of my earth.

Yemen Wahdi

I have completed my research for this and spend many hours deciding on which will be the correct approach to follow and also which satellite photos to use as inspiration for this project.

Shoemaker Crater Australia

At this stage I have completed 10 paintings in this series, some of which are shown in this blog. My aim is to end up with around 30, or until I have reached the stage where I have said what I wanted to.

Lake Carnegie Australia

It has taken a long time....

It has taken a long time for me to get here!

The Art Workshop was always a concept in the back of my mind and went through several developmental steps in terms of finding out what it should be and where I would like to go with it. Finally this painting became almost the personification of the idea. It depicts the different journeys that one should or inevitably would take during a lifetime. It a has a bright golden sun that reaches far beyond where you are at the moment and fills you with its life giving energy and warmth. It shows prosperity with the lush green land and trees and abundance of food (probably sheep - this is NZ). It also shows a simple easy life without stress but filled with lots of colourful experiences. I don't own this painting any longer, but I hope that the person that does enjoy what it brings to them.

I have taken the step to write about and show my art and share my passion. I will treat this blog as a Work in Progress (WIP) for current and future projects as well as a record of past projects and paintings.

Favourite quote

When we've grown up it may look as though creativity is dead and buried but it is still there, waiting for nuture and always ready for a new awakening.... From, go! the art of change, by Jonathan Milne.