Painting week 2

We worked with a large scale, display of marine plastic debris (flotsam) set up over several tables, walls ...  covering the entire back of our group art studio.

                                                       

My Final Piece

Working with runny/solid acrylic, matching & mixing our own colours

(I was quite pleasantly surprise that I managed to do this - never done still life's before.)

Final Piece - work in progress

Looking a this half way - its difficult to believe it would work out in a good way LOL

This is what we were working with (Isolated pieces) of which there were several tables full.  We had to use a hand held, self made frame (2 x L shapes) to select our pieces to work on.

   

 

  

 

  

Some of our other exercises are below:   

A thin, long section of a still life, focusing on tone and colour

 

                           Another thin, long section of a still life, focusing on tone and colour

Our easels were set up in a wide arc surrounding the flotsam display of several tables.

We worked with acrylics (Consistency of paint from runny/watery to thick) - mixing our own colours to achieve various tones, Indian ink and a piece of stiff cardboard to draw with etc

It was a great learning experience and we each focused on our own selection (using a hand held framing method) to compose our pieces of work.  Various thumbnails were quickly sketched to help with deciding on composition (Position/ direction of viewing still life's)

I was amazed at the A1 piece of work I produced, not think that I would have been capable of producing this : D

This is a piece (Below) we did using a piece of cardboard and Indian ink to represent tone 

(It was actually quite fun and I enjoyed it - after the initial shock).

The cardboard and Indian ink in tray that we used....

A wider view

My easel from a distance

 

All the student work on the wall for the first Indian ink exercise (Tone)

 

Isolated parts of my Indian Ink & cardboard sketch (Timed exercise)

We watched a video about the artist, Frank Auerbach - he paints 364 days a year and has several long standing models who he uses on various days of the week (some for 20 years) to produce artwork.  He had a traumatic childhood and lost his parents, due to WWII, at an early age.  His artworks do not seem to represent his subject but are more expressions of emotions, exploring the texture and colour of paint.  He also talks about wanting balance and perspective in his paintings.







Our final piece of learning was producing an abstract piece.  We had to chose what we were going to draw and draw it from 3 different positions within the studio (swapping easels).  Each time we drew in charcoal and then rubbed it off before starting from the new position.  The fain lines were still visible.

After the third sketch had been rubbed off we had a wide selection of lines and unrelated shapes to work with.  Our colour palette was taken from the objects on display and we could include the actual objects or work with the negative spaces.  I saw 2 faces (Head and shoulders) that mysteriously showed up within my lines and shapes.   I chose to highlight these as well as other negative space shapes that were created using this technique.  I did keep one buoy (flotsam) from the display. The Buoy had been the centre piece of each of my 3 sketches.  As I worked I discovered a couple of other faces hidden in the artwork.

This was again a timed piece so we did not get to finish it but it was a start and an interesting exercise - which produced varied results, from all the students.

At the end of the week we had a big clean up of the studio to get it ready for the October break.  One of the students played some background music form their own selection and it added a jaunty, pleasant holiday feeling to the end of term.

During the final clean up, a couple of us used our left over paint to make a "hand print" - this is mine... and another creation using the rest of the paint...

 

The music that was playing during the cleanup......

Rodrigo Sanchez and Gabriela 

We had our personal discussions with our tutors about our personal sketchbook projects and the topic.  I was not sure about the topic and wanted it to be something really good so chose to think about it over the October break.

My options were at this time:  The natural environment (which we had already explored in some detail), the stables environment (where we spend a fair part of our time).  One topic I was interested in was "design aspects" found in everyday life - the things that we sell differ in design and appearance but add to our lives   They are everyday but may overlook.   i.e. light switches, hinges, handles, vents - all have distinctive shape, style, texture and appearance but we are so used to them that we don't seem to notice them.  Having studies design last year - these were items I notice on a daily basis.  My tutor did not seem keen on this idea.

I want to chose a topic that will mean something, have a possible use, provide an insight and be inspired by something.  I hope something comes to me...

The topics of marine finds, the shoreline etc are very do-able but have been done to an extent and I would like to find something else appropriate and do able.

Apparently some other students are doing - items found in their homes.  I could do this but feel that these items and objects are personal.  We have a wide selection of art and ornaments that we have collected over the years but don't feel like I want to share them at this stage.  It is a topic that would be useful though at some stage.

The idea of having multiple sketch books does enter my mind:

• Stables
• Design Items
• The shoreline (including marine finds and flotsam)
• The natural environment

or there must be something else that has not revealed itself yet... :D  I hope a good idea comes to me over the October break.....