The Conversation

From one of the smallest watercolour paintings I ever did (doodle study-posted today) to one the largest.... this painting is twice the size of a usual large painting that I do! The image is an artistic interpretation of the inside of a cell, not a jail cell, but a living biological cell. The planet-like thing at the top represents the nucleus. The objects all have their own personality. In the original design there was a stark horizon line, but to create the illusion of endless space I covered it up with clouds and objects. There was also a cartoon-like character with a fishing rod in the foreground that did not go with the overall tone so I covered that up too. Gee, an artist is never supposed to reveal their secrets eh!?

I used several interesting techniques in this painting.. the little white dots over the planet-nucleus were created by throwing some salt on the moist wash. The bubble shapes (vacuoles) were created by dropping paint with a plastic pasteur pipette (borrowed from the lab). I also used the pasteur pipette to drop water onto my palette, this helped to create large volumes of paint needed for the big scale. The design was completely original, no prior doodles were used, I just had a general sense of the composition. It was challenging technically and mentally, you really feel the pressure to paint something great on a large scale.

30x44" hot press. April-May 2013

Doodle Study 2

Here is one of the smallest paintings I ever did, only about two square inches. It was for a contest I entered years ago for miniature paintings. While I did not win the contest one of the judges did buy my entry. The style is very much like Salvador Dali, the barren dessert, the prominent oddly shaped object. Perhaps I will do more miniatures some time?

2.5 x 2.5" cold press. 2004

Geraniums in Rust Pot

Here is an eary work I did in 1991 after taking the watercolour lessons. It is a copy of an oil painting from a calendar, rather than a study of live flowers. By copying oil paintings I learned to create very bright and juicy colours. It is easy using oil paints but takes a little more work using watercolour paints. This early work displays many of the qualities that would mark my work...for example strong colours, brilliant light, and colourful shadows. The signature is quite different than it is today... the scribble signature was developed sometime in the early 90's, there is a piece of paper from that era where I was practicing the scrawl signature maybe it will be worth something someday? 

Geraniums in Rust Pot, 9 x 12" hot press. watercolour paper 1991 (No. 0088)

Love Left Leave Lego

Another doodle painting, completed in the midst of painting the big project (which is now hopefully complete... The Conversation), this one depicts an emotionally painful scene using lego and abstract form. It was based on doodles from my notebooks as usual, these ones would have been sometime during 2012. I have in the past depicted emotional subjects, but usually I hid the message in a highly abstracted design. Painting emotional scenes using lego form was a good compromise, where I could tell a story but still keep an artistic buffer in between. Does that make any sense? If you look into this one, you will also see Beatles lyrics from their great album "Help" which I was coincidentally playing as I painted this one. Their tales of love and love lost were fitting.  As for the bird, I don't know what she is all about but hey, art is definitely a journey.

22x15" cold press. April 2013