Hi guys,
Today I thought I would talk about what I ve been working on this week myself and I thought it would be an oportunity to talk about a part of my painting process which I have always used, that being working on multiple paintings at once and the reasons why I find this so useful.
My painting process starts with a selection of thumbnail sketches, with the aim of exploring how I will break a space up, for example where my horizon line will be and where my simple structure lines will go. Once I have established a simple pattern of lines giving me a pathway into and out of the picture, then I will think about tone [light and dark]. I may use a simple tonal painting to explore this before progressing into colour.
Once I have decided on my structure lines I then set up several boards to work on. I usually work on between 3 and 5 paintings at once in my studio and if I work outside I usually grid paper out into different sizes and will work on up tp 9 paintings at once. I want to explore the value and reason behind doing this a little.
One of the main reasons I work like this is to prevent my work becoming too tight and I find I can react spontaneously as the landscape can change so quickly before me. Alternatively when I m working in the studio I will work on several paintings at once so as to explore different colourways and subtle changes that inspire a different feeling to a piece.
These are the three I have been working on this week,they are unfinished works, but I wanted to show and talk about the process of how I work. So 2 of these paintings have been worked through from the darkest tones and colours through to almost the lightest value and the largest of these at 1m by 1m has been completed to just over a half tone and colour, leaving the lightest areas to still be painted. I will post these again when they are completed.
I look forward to hearing your comments about the pieces and about the process. Please do ask if you would like to know more about the techniques I have used here.
I'm going to be posting on Tuesdays and Saturdays from now on, this will be an oportunity to pick up ideas and techniques from my teaching sessions at Cheltenham Fine Art on a Monday and Friday [Seeinfo@cheltfineart.co.uk if you may interested in joining us]. To my students these blogs will be a reminder of what you have learned and practised in your sessions. I will be posting throughout holidays with ideas and techniques that you may try to keep your practise going until term starts again this being the week beginning 11th April.
This weeks painting and drawing session took a decidely Eastery feel. We were consolidating drawing and painting skills that we had done this half term. We started with thumbnail sketches of groups of objects on the table. The aim of this is to be able to reduce what you see into simple shapes and use these to pin a more structured and detailed drawing on to. This is how I start off my creative process every time. I have found if I deconstruct objects like this each time it allows me to be able to draw anything however complicated it may seem.
Our next skill was mixing and using colour. We have worked hard this term using a selection of differing primary colours to see how they mix and behave with each other. Its a really great exercise to do however experienced you are. To play and mix your colours to remind oneself of how they work. As artists we often have a pallette of colours that we favour but I still feel there is value in stepping outside this and experimenting now and again to keep things fresh and moving forward.
Lastly we were exploring how objects relate to one another in a composition. Looking for interesting ways of linking through shadow shapes and negative space [the space around an object] and creating interest in these areas with colour and tone so as this becomes as important as the objects themselves.
Well I hope you have enjoyed reading this Tuesdays post and I hope to see you here on Saturday, have a good week everyone.
Get creating !!!!