I tried something different with this study, which isn’t yet finished. I saw a beautiful, small, sparrow-sized bird in the park while walking the dogs. Apparently, it’s a common bird here, but I’d never seen one before, and although it’s been several weeks, I haven’t seen one since. I found it in the bird guide I’d picked up for just such an occasion and learned it was a Chaffinch. It had a lovely blue grey head and rusty breast, with black and white banding on its wings. I made a point of remembering it because I thought its coloration would make an interesting ground for a painting: the colors were dramatically contrasting, and worked within my framework of using tones that chromatically oppose one another. I decided to try this on my black gesso'd board; however, when I laid down the paint using a palette knife, it covered the backing fully, so the black base became mostly irrelevant. That said, I liked the marks from the knife at the edge of the painted field and chose to keep the colors separate across a central divide of black. The next step will be layering line work on top of this. I’ve been thinking about doing something new here too: all white lines, but using an array of brushes that range from very fine (my smallest tip is 15/0) to wider, perhaps to a No. 2 or even a 4. There was an early generative pencil sketch I made focusing on the line spacing and weight, and it was interesting. It could work here. Perhaps the colors are more interesting behind a stark line layer.
For my other work in progress, prepared a week earlier on the largest board with white gesso base and ribboning undercoat, I got nervous. I wanted it to be the culmination of the generative paintings, and maybe I put too much into that plan. In any case, I didn’t want to go straight to paint like I have with the previous ones, and instead made a group of colored pencil studies. I landed on a set, but painting it will require several solid hours of uninterrupted, dedicated focus at a time, and there wasn’t enough this week. Again, the children had two days off school, and lacking alternative care, I would be the one entertaining them. It made me feel more American than ever: wondering why there are so many holidays when there’s so much work to do.
Mother’s Day Bud Vase 20210513 ©2021
My Mother’s Day tulips gorgeously captured the fading evening light coming in from the western sky through the kitchen window.