Something new?

It's the first official day of winter break, I'm free from my day job and excited for the time to focus on my art! I'm also excited by a new dream or goal I've just dared to have. It's too early to share just yet but I hope to share bits and pieces of it along the way and if/when this happens, believe me, I'll be sharing it. Here's to tantalizing new possibilities!

color theory

So it's a little hard to see but I wanted to share. I was working on a painting and noticed color theory in action. The same color will look different depending on its surrounding colors.

The green (though it looks more grey in the picture) triangles are completely the same but they looked different in the orange ring verses the blue. Color theory is cool.

The Process

I've been working on a new painting, I haven't actually started painting it yet but a lot of work has gone into it already.

It starts off in the sketch book, I try different things to see what might work and what doesn't. The next phase is to make a study, I haven't always done this but I'm trying to get better at it rather than winging it as much. Anyway in the study I draw out what I think the painting will or should look like and use colored pencil to give and idea of the colors I want and what they might look like. Things might change from the study to the painting. Drawing out the painting is the final step before painting.

More Museums

I was able to visit two of my local museums a few days ago and it was great. The Springville Museum had a variety of exhibits but the one I was most intrigued by was Fahimeh Amiri's miniatures, she learned the tradition and technique when she was a child, they are fascinating.

I also returned home to my alma mater and visited the MOA. They have a stunning exhibit, Treasures of British Art 1400-2000. I was thrilled to see paintings dating from the renaissance and of such famous subjects as the Tudors. I highly recommend checking it out!

"New" Designs

I've been wanting to get back into geometric designs since I stopped working on the Eight Fold series. I tried some hexagonal based designs inspired by some I've seen from Lisa DeLong, Jeea Mirza, and others. I've been trying something new with the paintings I've been working on and I'm not loving it, so today I took a break from them to try something different. I tried a couple of new (to me) designs from this book.

It probably should have been obvious but pastels are not the best for precision work. We live and learn. It's my first real attempt at pastels.

Walt Disney

Anyone else see the American Masters program on Walt Disney? I was able to catch most of it. Whether you like him or no, there's no doubt that Walt Disney has been incredibly influential. I grew up with Disney and so it was very interesting for me to learn more about the man behind it all and also to take a grown up and different look at things that I've previously looked at with childish eyes.

There have been full length animated movies my entire life and so it was very interesting to learn just how much Disney made animation what it is today, how much he changed it from a simplistic (sort of) entertainment, to a real art form and paving the way for such artists as Miyazaki, etc. I want to go back and re-watch things like Snow White etc. to really appreciate the visual splendor.

Museum days

I didn't actually paint today (or Monday, since it was a holiday) and that makes me a little sad, but today I did visit an art museum and in some ways I feel like that's just as important. I went with my friend to The British Passion for Landscape: Masterpieces from National Museum Wales exhibit. It was a nice exhibit with a lot of beautiful paintings etc. If you're a fan of beautiful and sort of pastoral landscapes, you'll be thrilled. Many of the paintings felt the same to me, though they were obviously different.

I was glad that I went with a friend, on my own in a museum I tend to speed through, perhaps not giving the art the consideration that it deserves; with my friend (who happily has a similar but perhaps slightly slower viewing speed than my own) along I was altering my standard walk through and spent longer looking at paintings, maybe even actually reading the cards posted with the paintings for more than just the artist name or medium and support used. It was also awesome that my friend and I were pretty much in agreement on taste, we liked and didn't like the same paintings. I don't like when I'm with someone at a museum or art show and they say "oh, isn't this wonderful" about something I think is ugly and perhaps wouldn't even consider art; I have very strong views and opinions on art and it's sort of rude to express some of the negative ones when someone wants to discuss art.

This has become a ramble and I'm not sure if I'll post if after all but I think the point I was trying for, is that it's good to get out and view good art, to view art that isn't your own and perhaps even to view the things that I don't consider to be art. It's good to get a little perspective, to be inspired, to study the techniques of others and to get out and do something a little different. I love a good museum trip, from the palaces of art to my own local and perhaps somewhat humble local museums.