Human Chain

Inspired by Degas and his ballerina series, this painting shows an abstract collection of humanoid forms connected together by flowing and interlocking limbs. I suppose that 'barrel of monkeys' also provided some subliminal input... those were the old toy where you got a plastic barrel of monkeys, they all had curvy arms legs and tails that could be hooked together into chains. There is no other hidden meaning in the painting (that I know of) other than a John Lennon-like message of peace, love, and... monkeys?

One way to create depth in a painting is to control the light/dark contrast. In the foreground, the characters have a high level of contrast, meaning that there are a lot of 'whites' and a lot of 'darks' in the same area. In the background notice how the contrast is much lower, i.e. the characters are mostly gray. In doing this, it creates a sense of atmosphere and distance, and also focuses the viewers attention on the foreground. The other trick is to provide more detail in the foreground than the rest of the picture... look at the floor, you see the shapes of the wood slats at the bottom (foreground) but towards the middle and background this detail is minimal or absent. So those are two good ways to create depth in a painting: higher value contrast and more detail in the foreground.

Human Chain, watercolour 11 x 15" cold press Fall 2012 (No. 3348)