Distortion

I decided to give acrylic paint a go instead of painting with oils which I have always done. There are some perks to working with acrylic paint that I like. A; it's cheaper. B; it isn't toxic. My studio isn't properly vented and is also attached to my bedroom where I sleep, so painting with oils in there isn't such a good idea. The draw back to acrylic though for me is that it isn't as malleable as oil.. you need a retarder or some other kind of added medium to make it easier to work with. Its really very different than oil, and this whole painting was really just a chance for me to learn how to work with it.. and near the end I started to figure out more and more things out about it. I still prefer oil, but maybe if i keep practicing I'll eventually like both.

Something I often do to help me plan for the colour scheme in a painting is experiment in some kind of paint program on the computer. That way I can see if colours are going to go well together and how they compliment the composition as a whole. I went real colour happy on this one from what I normally produce, and I'm not super keen on the end result but it's okay. I learned something... and I just watched fantasia. C'mon.

the solicitor

I've been enjoying working a little different lately with graphite, doing some experiments in my sketchbook. I feel like a whole new world has just opened up for me! I think this is going to be a fun new year in terms of artwork. I've bought a whole tub of powdered graphite, new sketchbooks, colour pencils, erasers, paper, etc... ohh yesss. My whole workspace is covered in a light film of graphite, as well as my hands. beautifully dirty.
These are from a 8.25 x 5 moleskin sketchbook, so I'm really excited now to try and up scale my drawings onto something larger.

Also, something new, I've started a Tumblr specifically for posting artwork. It's more strictly about just the artwork itself, whereas on here it's more personal and about my experiences, etc. I will also be writing a little more about the concepts on my work on there, which i know people sometimes are curious to know. So please FOLLOW me, because I know you're all closet hipster's and have a tumblr account.

cupid

When I started this piece I was so high on enthusiasm. It's like that strange addiction people can have to nostalgia.. breathing in those toxic oil paint fumes.. its heaven. It turned out just as I was hoping it would. I've had horrible experiences trying to work with colour before because I just don't yet have that familiarity of how it works yet.. but it's getting better.

Like the first time I painted the ocean. Ocean's blue right? My mind instantly categorized colours instead of actually looking at it on it's own. You can't look at what you're drawing or painting as if it is what it is.. because then you'll have pre-conceivced notions of what it should look like and not draw what it actually looks like. Therefore my ocean was the most synthetic primary blue imaginable. When my grade 12 teacher pointed out my mistake it was like a really begrudging light bulb turned on.. and after some grumbling and muttering about stupid paint I accepted my mistake.

Constructive criticism... I'd be no where without it. Thank you to all the people who have torn a tiny piece of my heart out and stepped on it. It's a difficult lesson to learn, to not cherish your work too deeply. You put so much time and thought and effort into a piece, and then if someone comes along and doesn't like it... it's like walking up to a mother and saying "Your child is ugly". It may be true but it hurts when they criticize your baby like that. You have to learn to not get too attached so that you can leave room to grow and change.

....but this piece is much too precious to me, so don't you dare criticize it. 

Oil on wood, 12 x 12

Portrait of my beau. :)

God Jul

Merry Christmas! or in Swedish, God Jul!

Oil painting on wood.
Yes, I am one of those second generation kids who are exhaustively patriotic to a country they can't even speak the language of... it doesn't matter. ssshhh. Now that Christmas has past I can publicly post a couple things I've been doing.. I like to give handmade gifts, so a lot of my paintings I've been making were for close friends and family.

aloevera

practice, practice, practice.

I found some tiny canvases in my stash last week, and decided to work some more on painting. I was really stoked about it and I wanted to try something totally different from what I'm used to musing over. My intentions were to paint in a really messy relaxed style.. and some how I just couldn't let myself do that. I kept trying to blend everything in smoothly and then I'd get mad at my brain. I think the you need to learn the rules and perfect the skill before you can start breaking the rules and painting in more experimental techniques and styles. I tried to mess with the contrast and exposure as well, because if you look you can see its not uniform throughout the whole piece... her pupils being barely black yet the chair falling totally into shadow. I don't know if it just looks like I've done a bad job or if it's cool.. haha. I've seen it done so well before in some paintings and it's a really nice effect.

Also, canvas... i hate it. How is this still an acceptable surface for painting? It's so textured and difficult and distorting.. I much prefer smooth surfaces where you can just push the paint around and it glides like butter. Mmmmm.

This is oil on a 8 x 8 canvas

sketchbook paints

Oil paints are my friends, acrylic paints are my acquaintances, and water colours are those babbling drunk people on the skytrain that you don't understand, don't want to understand and hope get off at the next stop. I've put some effort though into trying to understand acrylics  this past week. I did some small paintings in one of my sketch books for exercise, which was great fun, but I still find the paint kind of a pain. It dries so fast and had no lucidity, so I'm going to get some acrylic medium like most people suggest. It's now turning into that friend that you only hang out with when accompanied with that other friend....... maybe I'm taking the metaphor too far.

they're from my 3.5 x 5.5 sketchbook, each finished in 45-60 minutes.

Female Figure

Recently I had a small little.. discovery. It turns out I'm really not that far off from living up to my stereotype. I sat down in the driver's seat of my car and looked around.. it's a mess. There is wax stuck to my dash, coins, crumpled recipts, towels, shoes, bags, blankets, canned tuna, cords, dog treats, and plain old dirt. Dirty dirty dirt. Dirt: soil, sand, dead leaves, pine needles, pebbles, boogers (you weren't looking so I went for it). I sat down at my desk in my room and looked around.. it's a mess. Pens & pencils every where, over flowing garbage cans, dirty laundry, clean laundry, not dirty quite yet laundry, this little knick knack I didn't want to throw away, camera equipment, paint palettes, those thingys I decided I'd start collecting but don't collect anymore.. and I must sensor the rest. Holy cow... I'm a slob. I cannot keep a space clean, it's a difficult reality to accept. I can be exceptionally moody. My family can vouch for this or anyone whose had the pleasure of spending hours and hours of time with me. I can go on about vague airy ideas involving colours, "Those paintbrush strokes pour depth into my soul" and boring trite things become monumentally fascinating.

Typically artists are stereotyped as moody, messy, and sometimes a little eccentric. Kind of  like how accountants are stereotyped as nerdy and socially inept or actors as egotistical and extraverted. We laugh at the preconceived ideas and prod people with them in jest but never seriously believing that they have any weight of truth behind them. In fact when they are exercised as being facts, its on the verge of becoming one of the 'ists' (sexist, racist, etc) and people get offended by your lack of education.. because that's what people say now-a-days if you don't agree with their views. Now of course I'd never compare labelling oppression with the history of racism or sexism, but it does exist on it's own as a low sub category of discrimination in society. Those dirty hippies. So a long time ago when someone said to me after learning I was an artist "Oh, you must hate sports then." I naturally had to ask them to repeat themselves because I didn't understand the relevance of it at all. My pride puffed up and I immediately became agitated... until now. When I realized thinking about it.. I don't really like sports. I don't watch them and I don't play them. Other than volley ball and nice hiking I don't involve myself in any other kind..... oops.

Anyway, I guess secretly I'm a little stoked to fit so well into my role... and that maybe magically this will make me a better Artist. I shall now go do something unlogical and crazy.

 

This is just a drawing from my little 3.5 x 5.5 moleskin that I drew for exercise. Soon hopefully I'll be doing some real figure drawing classes again. Yay! Gonna get fit.. artistically.