Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Step #4 An Artist's Process for a Large Painting

Well, along with the 6'x9' painting I'm working on, I asked them if they'd like to have some of my students' work to brighten up the entire place.  They have 4,500 square feet of space with charcoal carpet and grey walls.  Sooo...

I had a lot of wood cut into twelve inch squares.  These they can arrange singly, in pairs, trios, or even big blocks of nine.  Kids from my three older classes are participating, so that'll mean we'll end up with 36 finished pieces.  This week I've had them sanding.  And sanding.  And sanding.  And gessoing.  One of my students said, 'This doesn't feel like art...'  I had to chuckle at that one.  Would that I was like Peter Max, having assistants stretch and prepare canvas, choose paint, trace projections, lay out brushes.... oh!  I'm dreaming!  I informed my disillusioned student and his comrades that yes, indeed, art in the making takes a lot of prep work and planning.
Speaking of prep work, this morning I went and bought a lot of paint.  I needed to get some of the squares finished to inspire my students next week.  I finished two nice squares, and painted three together to be hung as a vertical triptych.  Oh, yeah, and a really horrible one which I will either overpaint or burn.  And I will never show it to you!  Never!

They asked for my big painting to be partially abstract, and the paintings they had pulled off my blog were mostly abstract as well, so I'm going to have my kids work a lot in exploring color and follow the same tangent.  Today my son Grant and I enjoyed each other's company as we threw a lot of paint around.

Grant likes to make art with spray paint.  He makes a lot of stencils and does quite a bit of layering.  Here he is with a base coat on one of his pieces.  We make a pretty good pair as we paint, appreciate and critique each other's work.  We're both painfully honest, which helps each of us a lot.

 This photo is called 'find the purse.'  For five or six years I've had this black leather purse in my closet because I was simply tired of it.  Noting the $300.00 purses at the mall with bright designs on them, I thought, 'I can do that.'  So, I did.  Better.  Thought I'd pop it down on the tarp for a few new colors as long as we were throwing paint around.  Oh, and yeah... the watering can.  Just had to find one more thing to paint and it just happened to be sitting there.  I know, it looks like an Easter egg.  So be it.  It'll probably get another coat another time.


Yep.  Yours truly.  The painted woman.  I came to the conclusion long ago that if you spend all your time worrying about drips and splatters of paint, your artwork will come to nothing, so I come out sometimes looking pretty painted, too.  The art is first, and whatever everything else looks like, it doesn't matter.  Just come and stand next to me the next time I paint.  And hold still.

My big painting is, well, resting right now.  Tonight I was given a mission - to go purchase the wood for reinforcement.  My friend is going to come over Saturday morning and knock that out, so next week I'll finally be laying down some colors.  Can't forget all that prep work!

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