Weekend of 1-15-11

Here's a few snaps of what went on in the studio over the weekend. There was not as much time spent in the studio as originally hoped, but the 6 hours spent down there felt productive. Today is a floating holiday for me so after lunch with family I hope to get back down there.

Still finding proportion relationships and beginning to block in more value - light and dark. The stripes on the shirt are something that is starting to be considered, they too are beginning get roughed in.

45 minute blocks of time seem to produce the best results for me. Roughly 45 minutes on one thing, then onto the next. In working that way I never get to married to any one thing I am doing and the willingness to correct and revise something is stronger then when I have sunk 6 straight hours into painting something only to realize the proportions are off. Constantly returning with fresh eyes and a willingness to begin again.

Anyway, I started taping up some lines on these disjointed panels, building a pattern that will get applied later.

Detail of tape and paint.

Finished pattern, now I will wrestle with what value and hues to apply to this. One of the things I like about the tape and paint style of pattern application is that it reminds me of glazing a ceramic vessel and putting it into the kiln with a degree of anticipation. You had an idea of what was going to come out of the kiln but you were always surprised at certain aspects and sometimes with the entire piece. The same kind of experience is present for me in this pattern process. Covering the panels with paint and then removing the tape, strand by strand holds that same level of revelation and is a nice contrast to the representational images.

Putting the painting of the man with stripped shirt aside for a bit, this new image of a man with glasses is to begin on the panels above. Unlike the the stripped shirt image this one will be built on an existing panel (right), and two new panels, (left). The stripped shirt image was begun on a perfectly white base while this will be worked on and into an existing panel. The idea of background or simply ground affirmation and background denial is something that I haven't really thought about but when I was deciding how to begin this one I wanted to start on something already marked up. The panel on the right has seen many things applied to it as it was first painted on in April of last year.