Paper clowns and oily flowers

Years ago I saw my first ever cartoons - not animation, but the relatively simple paintings used as preparatory sketches for oil paintings or tapestries; these were by Goya and are in the Prado. Being self-taught, I learn about such things piecemeal - at galleries, in books, online - wherever - but they do prove inspiring even if filed away for later consideration. So, I had a big canvas and a picture in my head, and so I decided on an acrylic cartoon/sketch for a large-ish oil/collage . Here's what happened.

The cartoon for Human Jungle - there's no background but I've started added more textured, thicker paint over the flat acrylic layer e.g. bottom right.

Working on the central flower with oils - all the oil painting was done with a palette knife as I do enjoy a bit of impasto.

An early stage (detail from the bottom right corner)

A later stage - oil paints applied and gaps being filled, but still a way to go...

Most of the oil painting has been completed. Now, contrastingly monochrome images are selected from old art magazines, cut to shape and glued in place.

The final picture - the paper collage sections have been varnished and final oil details painted. In places the oils have been allowed to blend/smudge into the collage. Now to leave it to dry (which takes time for thick oils), somewhere that our cat can't get at it!

(Mixed) media storm

Over the last couple of months I've been working on all manner of projects - wall sculptures (there's now about a dozen), tattoo design (part 3 to come), poetry and jewellery commissions, and even trying to complete the occasional canvas. It's the latter I want to share here and is an oil with a few mixed media/collage elements. Though in many ways it would be technically easier to put the collage on last, I like embedding these elements in the paint, therefore they are added at an fairly early stage for me to paint round, or indeed partly over. I hope you like this one; it's called 'The Wreck of the Hope' and is intended for an exhibition in late spring 2015 (details nearer the time).

The Wreck of the Hope, oil and mixed media on canvas, 39 x 45cm.

Detail from The Wreck of the Hope.

Take one long poem and some disturbing current events...

...and mix well. I have been reading Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, and already have an interest in current affairs in the Middle East. So, images of dark towers, skeletal fingers casting gold lucre, and oil in the burning sky, but also tiny plants flowering amid the chaos, combine to form my latest oil painting Childe Harold in Gaza. Hope you like it. I don't discuss politics on this blog, but if you're interested in views similar to mine, PSC is a good place to start.

Childe Harold in Gaza (2014). Oil and gold paint on canvas, A4 (approx)

I built this city from, er, stuff and paint

Over the last few weeks, I've been working on a new painting/mixed media piece entitled 'City'. It was one of the more technically challenging pieces I've attempted, encompassing painting, ink-drawing, collage and some unfamiliar techniques/materials so here's an insight into the stages it went through.

The initial collage layout - plastics, polystyrene, card and wood on laminated hardboard.

Everything was spray-painted white. It makes a good photo, but in reality looked like what it was - a blank-but-heavily-textured canvas.

Sections of text from a lecture on NGOs and environmental law, and graphs from scientific papers on ecology were photocopied onto acetate sheets, then cut and attached to the discs already present.

The background was painted in black oils.

The black background highlights key features such as the organic structures made by applying solvent-based (but non-toxic!) products to polystyrene.

'Stars' and 'galaxies' are added in white spray, oil and acrylic paints. It is now a city in space!

Details at this stage include a fox and an angel... to my eye, anyway - to yours?

The final stage - 'circuitry' details in black ink.

The finished piece - 'City' (80 x 60cm). Texture is a huge part of it, and a photo doesn't really convey this, but I hope you like it. Once framed it'll be up for sale...

This is not a homage to Magritte

My painting's been fairly eclectic so far, but does seem to be coalescing into a couple of core styles (for now) - 'cyber' and 'thick oils'. The Quantum Triptych is of the first type, so here's one of the others, entitled 'This is not a portrait (storm)'.
 

'This is not a portrait (storm)' - oil and acrylic on canvas, 80 x 100cm

As the title rather strongly suggests it ain't a portrait in that it is not of anyone in particular. It is also, for me, unusual in that it is more-or-less representational rather than abstracted. It is however textural (I like to get through a lot of that costly goop-in-tubes) so here's a bit of detail:

'This is not a portrait (storm)' - detail

'This is not a portrait (storm)' - detail - trying to access just a tiny bit of my inner Frank Auerbach maybe!

So, why the title? Well it sounds like it's a play on Rene Magritte's famous 'pipe' painting The Treachery of Images, but it isn't - at least not consciously so. Instead, please feel free to make of it, and the storm subtext, what you will - and more importantly, enjoy!