November Free Draw

I know that it is late in the month to write about this but the free draw for November, for signing up to receive email updates to this blog, is a giclee print of the cello painting posted here today. Remember you have to be in to win!

You will find the box to sign up just down a little and to the right. Do it NOW!

Abstract Painting

I feel this piece is finished although after a few more days I will probably find something I want to change. Next week I will be back into printmaking. I have some ideas I am eager to try out.

I have finally set the dates for my two printmaking workshops at the Atlanta Artists Center. The first one, Simple Printmaking Without a Press, will be on Saturday January 17th. In mid March I will do the Collagraph Printmaking Workshop which will be two full days. The dates for this are March 22nd and 23rd. I'm really looking forward to doing both these workshops. Once all the info is up on the AAC web site I will put a link here to it.

Abstract In Process Sailing Along

I have been busy in the studio again today. I had this nice sized canvas just waiting for something to be put on it. It's 30 inches square so a good size to work on. I wanted to work in a more abstract way again and while looking through a magazine I saw some pictures of sail boats. They have lovely swooping lines which really appeal to me. I seem to have a fixation for lines and flowing shapes.

Inspired by the sails I drew out a few shapes and then started adding lines and shapes that flowed organically from one to another until I got a basic design that I liked however I kept extending and deleting lines as I went along. Before I laid out the design on the canvas I made a messy underpainting with lots of colors and drips etc to get me started. I then began to block in the shapes by painting around each shape with color.

I have posted two photos of the process up to where I am now. I have lots of transparent layers ready for the next stage which is to start using more opaque paint You can see a couple of places where I have started this already. It's always exciting to see where the process leads and if it is successful or not.

Abstract Work

I have been taking a break from printmaking to play around with some more abstract work. I used to work this way a lot but recently my paintings have been leaning towards a more realistic look. It has been fun and I am eager to experiment with more of this type of work in the future.

I had a tidy up in my studio last week although looking at it this morning you would never think that I had. Part of the clean up included pulling out lots of work and trashing some of it. Every six months or so I like to have a throw out. I keep things for a time as a record of what I was doing and to see if there has been any progress. A few pieces I have kept for years and others only a month or so. Lots go in the bin the day I do them especially the work from the life drawing session I try and attend each week.

This week at the life drawing I decided to work in oils instead of just drawing. The pose was quite stiff and unnatural looking but the girl had this wonderful curly orange hair. The session was only a couple of hours so it's unfinished but I've posted it here, along with one of my abstracts, to show you the two different kinds of work I have done this past week. You can see how strange they look together. The "Girl with the Orange Hair" painting is likely to be trash in a week or so too.

Musical Collagraph Update

I ran another print from the musical plate. I think it's better than the first two but I still think the colors could be improved. If you feel like making a comment or suggestion that would be great.

Musical Themed Collagraph

At last I have been able to get back into the studio and do some printmaking. You may remember, if you have been following my blog, that I spent some time building a set of four musical themed collagraph plates to print as one image. I printed up a couple but then got busy with some paintings and other stuff and never got to printing up all four together. Yesterday I pulled two prints from them but was pretty disappointed with them both. I was experimenting with viscosity roll ups starting with an intaglio in dark blue, followed with a hard roller roll up in red, followed by a soft one in yellow. The idea was for them all to overlay and create some beautiful greens and purples as well as the colors that I used however that didn't happen. While doing the first one I was interrupted and the paper dried out a bit and the inks too, so the image isn't as sharp or dense. Also the yellow didn't blend with the blue in many places and so is just too bright. The second one I did in the same manner but used a cad yellow and cad red to try and dull it down a bit but it is still too bright. The great thing about all this though is how much you learn each time you proof a plate. The other challenge with this print is the size relative to the size of my press. The image is 32 inches long and the press bed is only 36 inches so it was difficult to get the paper trapped under the roller, get the plates tucked in close and then have some room left at the other end to hold the roller on the print bed once the print has been rolled through. I think I will have another attempt to print this plate but ink it up in my usual way and then see how it turns out.