In the eye of the beholder …

Painting, or more specifically, what constitutes a ‘good painting’ is something that has no doubt been contested since the dawn of time when man first began daubing paint on cave walls.  You can almost discern, through the mists of time, the first critic carefully contemplating some abstract image of a hunting party bringing down a mammoth, I  wonder how long he paused before delivering his verdict with the business end of his wooden club … and creative types think the critics now can be harsh!!

Jolene and I spent the day yesterday wandering around the Kelvingrove Art Galleries and Museum, a long day with kids in tow but well worth it for the fantastic range of arts and crafts from across time from Egyptian artefacts, to Scottish pre-history through to reflections on modern society.  The Art Galleries have an extremely fine selection of paintings, not least of all one of Jolene’s favourites, Salvador Dali’s Christ of St John on the Cross, and my own personal favourite, Van Gogh’s, A Portrait of Alexander Reid, pictured below:

Jolene and I actually decided to buy a small framed reproduction of this painting from the museum shop, although we weren’t necessarily so keen to be hanging Jolene’s favourite Dali anywhere in the house!

Coming back from the galleries, and having enjoyed a quiet dinner down at the pub, we came home well fed and well motivated, if for no other reason than it can be difficult to wander around any gallery now without looking at some of the exhibits and wondering just how some of the items can be considered to be art, let alone of high enough calibre to be hung in a prestigious gallery.  Faced with paintings that you feel your three year old could produce given half the chance it’s difficult not to think, I could do that!

So we did!

Jolene started it when she began slapping red paint onto a canvas (7″ x 9.5″), and to be honest I thought that that would be that, I had already named it ‘red paint on canvas’ … a masterpiece to behold and clearly befitting of any up market gallery.  Alas there was no stopping her and she carried on initially by gluing on a foreground and then over-painting this with some actual subject matter, by this point she had already made some of the ‘modern art’ I’ve seen elsewhere look amateurish and so it was she ended up with the picture above.

Meanwhile, I wasn’t about to be outdone by Jolene and had made a grab for my own canvas (12″ x 12″) – typically for me it already had some unfinished rubbish on it – following Jolene’s lead though it wasn’t long until I too had daubed over the canvas with red, indeed I had already named this one too, ‘even more red paint on canvas’ … genius, eh?!

I was kind of perturbed when I saw that Jolene wasn’t going to be content with slapping some paint on the canvas and that I might actually have to put some thought in to what I was doing, I ruminated a some ideas many of which I had to discard as they were too involved, beyond my ability to execute or clearly plagiarised from somewhere else and instead I ended up with this (below).

It’s funny though how ones attitudes change to art as you get older, there was a time when I couldn’t understand how someone might stand and look at a painting for any more than a moment, yet when you actually see some of the true masterpieces in person there is so much to see beyond the bigger picture that it can be difficult not to look at them with a more discerning and focused eye, you don’t need to like everything you see, but you should be able to decide what you like and why.

Just from a general interest point-of-view I thought I would just upload a couple of the other paintings we have hanging around the house.

We were gifted the painting above by Jolene’s mother and father who brought it back from a trip of a lifetime to Nepal.  The one below was picked up during our Holiday last year in Wester Ross from a lady who ran a small shop out of a shed selling soap, her son was the artist and he had produced a few of these paintings featuring a central Celtic Knot design.

No place like home

We were recently gifted this painting by my mother who, after a long period of abstention, has finally lifted a paintbrush again.  Jolene and I were delighted to receive it, not least of all since it’s a painting of our (and our neighbours) house, it’s based on a photo from a couple of years back and features one of my nephews a long with our wee lad and lass.  Of course, all we need to do now is find somewhere to hang it which, given the state of disrepair our home is currently in is easier said than done!!

Typically, the photograph has washed the colours out and no amount of fiddling in the photo editor, with my limited skills, was going to fix that I’m afraid.  Still it was a lovely gesture and Jolene and I will be delighted to hang it … just as soon as we have somewhere to hang it!!

Papier mache wall art

It’s been commented on in the past that there are strange things going on in the dark recesses of my mind, that they seem to bleed out into the light through what I create … I think ‘they’ may have a point.

I seem to have a raft of canvasses lying around and despite repeated attempts to paint something of any worth on them I seem to fail and fail again.  The canvas here has been used so many times now that I can’t recall how many images lie beneath this final effort, perhaps it’s a furious amalgam of all that went before, a seething anger at the ineptitude slapped on the canvas below.

Whatever it is, using a canvas as a base for some wall art/sculpture is an avenue of interest to me and something I feel sure I will pursue further at some future point.  In the meantime I can think of at least two (more conventional) sculptures that deserve to be finished after well over a years worth of idling!

Etsy Picks: Sunshine

With all the snow that has been bombarding some parts of the world this past couple of weeks you’d be forgiven for forgetting that there is such a thing as sunshine or summer. With that in mind, we thought our readers might like a little reminder:

Bring Your Own Sunshine by DUDADAZE ~ $10

Sensational Stripes Fused Glass Plate by Kirsty Sly ~ $52

Sunshine by shopgimme ~ $150

My Sunshine (personalise) by mishmashmarket ~ $40

Click on the images to go to the shops and see more from these talented artists.

more papier mache guy – work in progress

I had hoped that the guy would have been dressed/assembled today, sadly though a complete failure for any clothes to materialise have meant that this hasn’t happened.

I have however, completed my part of the group project though and spent a few hours last night (on top of the many hours construction time) finishing off the treacherous painting stage.  He’s looking a bit pink now, although at one point he looked a lot more like salmon mousse than I had planned!  Of course, such things are painted up in series of layers … something I’m prone to forgetting during the initial burst of enthusiasm required for me to get started … he’s also got a squint!?

So, it looks like I’ll be taking a trip to a charity shop tomorrow to see if I can get some appropriate clothes for this chap.  I’d hoped to get hold of a John Lewis catalogue, but I think a prominent receipt sticking out of his pocket with the words, “MP’S Expenses” will need to suffice for my wee political dig this year … last year he was a banker!

Papier mache guy – work in progress

This seems to be becoming an annual event for me, doing the guy’s head for the local playgroup that sees the fellow deposited in the local shop where he’s required to raise funds for the little kiddie-winkles activities, not that it bothers me at  all.  On the contrary it’s a good re-introduction to using paper pulp in sculpture following the summer when I’m more inclined to sit out with a lump of wood and a set of knives … not something I’m so inclined to do during the autumn and winter months when the notion of straying far from the stove fills my heart with dread!

Probably my biggest fear in doing the guy is finishing it, a poor paint job can make even the best sculpture look like some pre-school effort … and this is far from being ’the best sculpture’ making the paint job all the more important!  So in the interests of preserving it in some fashion prior to painting I like to get a few work in progress pictures for posterity’s sake.

I’ll do a further post once he’s finished off in all his glory, and maybe get a couple of pics of him in-situ in the shop, before the final incineration on bonfire night

Devilish abstract in watercolours and acrylics

I decided to do this after Jolene’s last post in which she was using toilet paper as a medium for her ATC’s (Artist Trading Cards).  I really liked the way her colours worked out and I saw something dark in her little pocket sized pieces of art.

I suppose some folks might consider this plagiaristic in some sense, although I don’t personally see it that way.  Certainly the image I’ve created contains elements from Jolene’s paintings, although I have used toilet paper in paintings previously (admittedly not to the same extent).  I heard this quote the other day though, and I’ve heard it before, although I can’t remember where:

… every artist is a cannibal, every poet a thief …

I suppose the notion being that there is no such thing as an original idea, only an amalgam of other ideas.  Certainly my inspiration here comes from somewhere different than Jolene’s.

The painting was done on a 12″x12″ canvas layered with loo roll and partly sculpted/molded to generate the raised area, this was overpainted with watercolours and later dry brushed with acrylics.

Simple boat painted in acrylics

I think I’ve said before that painting is little more than a diversion for me and certainly not something I have any great talent for, although I would like to improve my skills at least a little in the coming years!  Bearing this in mind I decided to make use of an online challenge, challenges are set monthly and have a time limit

I think it”l be a useful learning tool and I’ve already learned something.  Thus far I have learned that I should read the instructions more carefully as this meets none of the key requirements set, deary me!

Still, I had fun doing it and I suppose that that counts for something!

toilet paper as an art medium

Sometimes inspiration comes from the strangest of places…no, I wasn’t sitting on the loo thinking about art; I spotted the toilet paper ATC swap on SwapBot (did I mention I’m addicted to that place) and decided to give it a go.

toilet paper, wire, watercolour paints, pva glue

Here’s what I did:

Painted the background with black watercolour paint and let it dry, rolled toilet paper around a piece of wire and coloured it with watercolours (mainly red), curved the wire and glued it to the background.  I then wet sheets of toilet paper and pushed them down over the wire, painted then while they were wet with watercolours and spread PVA glue liberally over the top.  I painted more layers of glue over the top when that was dry to give them a sheen and to seal the toilet paper.

I think they look ok.  I think the colours are a bit bright for my liking and the medium isn’t one I’ll be using again in a hurry, but I’m pretty pleased with the finish.

These have all been mailed to America today.

another abstract oil painting and some runic news

First of all just a wee note on the runic and ‘little dancer’ pendants, I’ve now uploaded these to the shop and they’ve been priced at $7.50 incl. postage … UK buyers wishing to purchase in £ sterling should drop me a note either via the shop or via the contact page here.

Now, on with the blog post proper! 

Continuing in the, “I can’t paint real things”, vein I’ve been messing about with oil paints again.  This is my second effort with them and whilst they do take an extraordinary period of time to dry and can be hellishly messy they are absolutely fantastic to work with and I’m pretty sure I’ve not even scratched the surface in terms of it’s versatility!

This painting only came about because I’m too tight to throw paint away and I had some left over after my earlier giraffe effort.

Aside from from daubing paint onto boards I’m also working on another carving which is a bit of a pain in the thumb, not least of all because I’ve not done it for a while, but also because I keep stabbing myself in the fingers with my new gouges!  The gouges are proving to be a fine investment though and I think they’ll allow me to add an extra dimension to my work, a new intricacy.

Hopefully I’ll also be picking up some of my incomplete papier mache sculpture and get on with these too, although I may need to deposit them somewhere in plain site so that I don’t forget about them!