Progression

IMG_3692, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

I love the Third Style of painting from Pompeii. It struck me as soon as I saw it, face-to-face. Since that time, I've been attracted to small pictures centered within a wide expanse of color. In my senior show at Centre, I had a few panels drifting on top of a darkly-painted background. Now, I've been drawn to squares, especially these great 12" x 12" pieces of gessoed masonite.

In addition, I've gathered a number of photos I've taken that I think are simple and bold enough to stand on their own against the stark white.

I love how quickly these paintings come together. Here is how I do it:

I traced around a picture and then put painter's tape on the outside edges to keep them crisp.

Next I filled in the background color.

Then I painted my image.

This shows the color variation in the black parts of the bird.

Remove the tape and voilà!

I like that I can do this in an hour or less. Since I'm starting back to school and am giving up my studio space (*bawl*), I need to find little nuggets like these that can be done in a small area and in a space of an evening. It's somewhat mindless, since I'm copying a picture exactly. I don't know how I feel about that. I hope that the time I took to compose the shot and then pick it out makes up for the simple copy-and-paste element of converting it to paint. I see this as more of a study, but I could see these be more popular than something intricate like a portrait. Lastly, I am really trying to pare down which images work in oil, versus watercolor or pencil or pastel. That is a really tricky decision to make. I hope it gets easier.

What do you think?

Animal Studies

IMG_1593, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

Just a few studies of some beloved pets. Whitley, above, and Artemis and Flower are below.

IMG_1585, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

IMG_1582, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

Summer: Take 2

IMG_1577, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

Nothing says summer like daisies in your hair, a pretty white cotton dress, and green, green grass. Although there is not a lot of contrast in her face, I think this would work really well as an oil on canvas. These are the types of pictures that make portraiture easy: good color, simple composition, and (for me) high contrast between background and foreground. Some portrait artists insist on lighter backgrounds, but I like the depth of the dark backgrounds, as they tend not to compete with lighter skin tones.

Man in Nature

DSC04483, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.

If I could remember my art history, I could cite for you a number of painters that employed this drastic juxtaposition of a small human within the context of a very large landscape. Caspar David Friedrich comes to mind with some of his landscapes, though certainly there are others to whom this style would more readily be attributed.

It reminds me a lot of a shot I took earlier in the year:

DSC05387, originally uploaded by aunt.meeb.