It has been awhile since my last post partly because the painting productivity has slowed down a bit this term. It is also difficult to take quality pictures in the winter because all I have is a regular camera and no professional lighting something that would be great to rectify. At any rate, here is a painting done in the doodleism style that also incorporates several composition elements designed to make you feel uncomfortable. The characters in the foreground are purposefully robotic and non-human looking... this concept is called 'The Uncanny Valley' it refers mostly to robots that are meant to look human- the Japanese Scientists have developed some robots that have fake plastic skin and look kind of creepy. Try googling 'Uncanny Valley' can see what comes up. The issue is that humans perceive small differences in faces as representing sickness or death, and naturally feel repulsed.
To make matters worse I implemented the "dutch angle" a technique used in film to make a movie scene feel dangerous or exciting- Hitchcock used this a lot. In the painting I convey this with a diagonal horizon and skyline.
I combined the Uncanny Valley and the Dutch Angle as a sort of experiment- the final product however looks strangely serene... perhaps I should subtitle it strangely serene?
22 x 12" cold press, watercolour, fall 2013
