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Brushes, Knives, Toothpicks, Paint sticks, Finger painting…
It is interesting how these course exercises get me to play with the paint in ways I wouldn’t normally on my own. I’ve often considered many of these exercises, but put aside because I want to get the painting, not to the grind.
But how else do you learn?
I took the brief rather literally here. You can see me loosening up as I go. Painting was done counter clockwise starting from top right (because, why not?). It ends with gloved finger painting (claw marks?) where I gave up on avoiding mess.
A big 1″ brush made the most interesting strokes. I like how they drag and skip across the textured canvas.
Layering with a palette knife, then dragging a brush handle through the resulting layers. I quite like this effect.
If I want to get good layers, I have to be very light with the knife.
I’m curious the effect if I were to layer this up significantly, let it dry, then cut through it. I’ll add this to the to-do list.
Also, forks or combs through wet layers. parallel lines. more for the to-do list.
Mixing it soupy with linseed oil. One soupier than the other. I like how it cuts through. I intentionally didn’t mix the dark green thoroughly, so chunks are left.
Okay, so what about paint sticks, and shaping, and finger painting? A variety of just messing around here. Some palette knife work to explore what it would look like to not mix the paint before applying. Layering and cutting through wet paint. Drawing with a paintstick, and then coming back and fingerpainting (gloved) with white spirits.
What about powdered pigments?
In Drawing 1: Drawing Skills, I picked up a bunch of powdered pigments so that I could learn how pastels work. I also made pastels out of my garden dirt.
So, why can’t I do the same with paint? Of course, I wasn’t interested in making a tube of paint today, but rather to see what happens if I drop powdered pigment straight into linseed oil.
From left, clockwise: Garden dirt, carbazole violet, quinacridone red, cassel earth, pthalo blue, prussian blue.
oil saturated garden dirt.
Why not throw some dried yellow flower petals into the mix to see what happens? I like how they stand out against the blue and black, but expect the linseed oil will destroy them. We’ll find out.
Pigments mixed with the linseed oil via toothpicks and a very soft synthetic fan brush.
Love the shine. I wonder if it will stay. There is a thick layer of oil. It will take forever to dry.
Very drippy. I can sort of see architecture in those drips. Like a cathedral apse. Another to-do list item to return to.
Different Supports
I love the look that painting on copper or aluminum brings. I want to try painting on slate.
I have some copper panels — I have not dared to touch them yet. I don’t want to “ruin” them.
But, I have blank printed circuit boards. These are cheaper, and good enough. I have no idea how they will last, as the copper is a microscopically thin layer that is designed to be removed via acid in the manufacturing process. I have no idea how the underlying resin laminates will last — unlike diamonds, computers are not for forever.
Anyway, some fernlike squiggles on copper circuit board and I love the result. I tried some flesh tones as well and they just glowed. I have a few more circuit boards (and can cheaply acquire more) and so will likely experiment more this way.
I like the idea of botanical/floral pictures on these. There is an interesting material juxtaposition.
Bokchoy is not Fruit
The syllabus says “paint some fruit”. Well, I went with bokchoy which definitely isn’t fruit. But it is plant? anyway. It looked more interesting.
Starting with venetian red with lots of white spirit to tone the paper. I’m using the word “tone” generously here. Might be more paint here than what “tone” suggests.
Here I’m using Arches oil paper, which I’ve never used before. I used a big chunky brush, and tried holding it by the tip of the handle (following along from the Florent Farges video, below) and oh-boy do I love the swirly strokes I could create here. Then a shop towel to roughly define the bokchoy and table.
I tried to keep my hold on the brush at its most loose. I tried to avoid just slathering paint down. But to scribble the brush through the paint.
I think, on the left side of the picture, I could reduce the contrasts here. Drive them bluer. The light came mostly from behind/through the bokchoy leaves which caused the yellow-green on the right. But the left was more reflected light, and so should have been bluer.
Perhaps I’ll redo this. So much going on the to-do list.
Pastels
I have quite the collection of soft pastels at this point. During Drawing 1, I got into a need to understand the variety of hardnesses and colours and such. I’m very materials focused at times.
I hate the messiness, and the fragile nature of pastels. I love the colours. I don’t understand how to use them effectively. Not at all.
Terry Ludwig pastels. So soft that they crumble if you look at them funny. I like how they skip across the surface of the paper.
A sad little bokchoy.
A number of brands. Mungyo at the hard end of the spectrum, Schmincke at the incredibly soft (though not Terry Ludwig soft)
My own pastels, made with pigment powders and methylcellulose. The garden dirt was hand mulled, and I gotta say: I dislike that process.
A few days later…
The linseed oil has done its thing (cured?) and the textures have popped up.
Prussian blue pigment granules create a sand-like texture. Its interesting how they collect at the edges of the drip line.
Garden dirt is very matte, and the flower petals have not been utterly destroyed. Very interesting.
Here, the pthalo blue has mixed into the petals and done their complementary colour magic: mud. Those petals that manage to stay on top pop out agaisnt the blue background.
And salt. Because I can’t stay well enough alone, i wanted to see what coarse salt would look like. I love this texture and transparency. I figure the salt will destroy any artwork over time, presumably by absorbing humidity from the air and recrystallizing, but that might be something interesting to play with. I wonder if there are similar materials I could use that would give me the same visual effect. Glass or transparent acrylic grains?
Video Tutorials
I am a big consumer of online videos. I often need to see how things are done, to truly understand. Pair up the words/descriptions, with the action on camera. This really is how I’ve learned most of my technical skills: Drawing or painting along to YouTube. Anywhere, here are two that came up while I was working on this project.