Expressiontist Portraits: (May - June 2001) A series of Expressiontist Portraits
I never would have expected just how stressful purchasing a property and moving has been. It was all very very exciting, overwhelmed, draining, and stressful. A lot of time was sent packing, clean, and preparing for this transition. It is one thing to move all your personal belongings... it is another to move over 200 works of art. Two of the paintings I had stored were too large to be moved into our new property so I donated one to the Newham Libraries (Map. oil on linen. 200 x 283 cm. Aug-Sept 2000). Roger McMaster (Head of East London Libraries) is putting it in the new Forest Gate library (will be on display and construction completed Spring 2002). The other painting I had to find space for was Willow World. 70 x 102 inches. oil on linen. July - Aug 1999. It is currently on display at Cafe Mondo in the Stratford Library.
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| Self Portrait. charcoal on paper. 11 x 17 inches. June 20th 2001. |
Graham Neale of the Big Van Company helped us with our move. His company primarily deals with antics and speciality moves. But when you have over two under paintings you really need professionals. It would have been too stressful to hire some Joe Average... the move when prefectly... better than I could have anticipated.
One would expect oneself to be extremely happy, but at the same time I became very depressed. With all the responsibilities I could not find the time to painting for ten days. That was the first time in three years that I had stopped painting for such a long period.
The drawing to the right is a study / an exercise. When drawing things can happen so immediately. You can have an idea, scribble, explore... when you are painting the materials are slightly more complicated.
If you do not approve of a drawing you simply turn the sheet over and start again. While painting you most likely find yourself removing paint, editing, painting over, and making the necessary adjustments to continue.
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| Self Portrait. charcoal on paper. 11 x 17 inches. June 20th 2001. |
A friend of mine (Scott Schwager) came over to my house for the day to paint. Both of us set up our equipment in my backyard and painted for the entire day. It was the first time Scott came over to the new place. His company gave me the confidence to start painting more raw and intense subject matter. Prior to this I had been working on a study of Mattisse's Snail painting (X 2), a couple House painting, and the Decent of the Sparrow.
Self Portrait. oil on linen. 16 x 26 inches. June 2001. SOLD
Private Collection of Kendal Carnell - London
This particular canvas has another painting underneath it (Willow World - rotated 90 degrees). I was not satisfied... I tried for months to rework the Willow World painting, but I left the canvas off to the side in the storage room. The surface hardened, and it gave an excellent slick, hard, textured surface to work on.
Over the past month I have been trying to add a green pigment to my color range. In the last month and a half I have grown more familiar with Michael Harding's Terre Verte Green, and his Bright Green Lake. For the past two years I have been using the Winsor & Newton Artists' Oil Colour Cobalt Green Deep. But it only available in a 37 ml tube (very small) and is price at £23 something... I have put up with this for the last couple of years, but after using Harding's Terre Verte Green I find the quality of W&N artists' colour significantly inferior to Harding's paint...
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| Pregnant Woman? oil on canvas. 16 x 24 inches. June 2001. Price £500 |
The painting: Woman Pregnant? (image to the left) is an Encounters with Pierre Auguste Renior's 'Torse de Femme au Soleil'.
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| Pierre Auguste Renior's "Torse de Femme au Soleil". |
A fellow painter friend and his wife recently (half planned) got pregnant. Also one of my patrons recently informed me that they are six and a half months and shortly expecting.
The Renoir painting used viridian green and emerald green in the background. He rapidly worked wet-in-wet leaving the ground and canvas texture showing through.
In future works I intend to add these these greens to my palette. In Pregnant Woman? I painted over a previous scrapped away canvas, that was washed with a a blue/olive green wash. And then work wet-on-dry layers which obscure the canvas texture.
Someday I hope to create a painting as beautiful and incredible as Renoir's 'Torse de Femme au Soleil'. But I feel like a surgeon with a shovel and hack saw. Renoir has butterflies, rainbows, tender, soft...
Before moving I completed the two below Self Portraits. They are both very small canvases (11 x 14 inches). I refrained from undertaking larger scale work at the time... with the prospect of having to transport these wet canvases I felt it would be more practical to work small.
Self Portrait. oil on canvas. 11 x 14 inches. May 2001. Price £300
Available through Modern Artists Gallery
Self Portrait. oil on canvas. 11 x 14 inches. May 2001. Price £300
Available through Modern Artists Gallery