MORE DIGITAL ART

No heavy “preaching” today, just some more examples of the wonderful rocks from Queensland, Australia.

Great reference material for abstract painting, don’t you think?

Monday: The Glover Prize 2013.

Richard

BURNIE ART CLASS 2.

Part 2 of last Saturday’s art class that I conducted for 12 members of the Burnie Coastal Art Group.

It’s essential that you organise your work area especially when working with an unfamiliar technique. Everyone used acrylic paints, PVA glue, mountboard pieces in a variety of sizes, icy pole sticks, hair dryers,  a palette or plate, as well as mountboard sheets, watercolour paper and canvasses to paint on.

By adding glue the paint became thicker, not too much though, as the paint became lighter in tone. The longer one left the paint with glue out to dry, the stiffer it became.

This is potentially messy work. One needs to mix each colour thoroughly to avoid dirty colours.

Besides their graphite drawings of rock patterns, members had rocks and a selection of images that I had prepared that featured close-up views of various rock surfaces.

This was the time of the day to experiment, to see what worked and what didn’t. This was the time to be brave and patient!

Why a hair dryer, you ask? Because some of the painted areas were quite thick, hair dryers were used to quickly dry the paint to enable other layers to be applied. It worked!

Tomorrow I will show you some examples from the morning session.

Richard

NATURAL ABSTRACTS: Part 1.

Nature continues to be an inspiration for my art whether it’s realism or abstraction.

Today’s image is a quick working drawing that I outlined on paper, scanned and then colour-filled in Photoshop. The idea is to develop the patterns on the many rocks that I am currently drawing and “drag” them out from the surface of each rock and onto the surrounding areas of the pastel board that I use for my coloured pencil art.

This type of drawing is well suited to digital art, but I want to explore the possibilities with coloured pencil first.

Working on a single subject for a long time can be quite boring. Looking at such a subject as rocks in a new light not only creates new possibilities, but re-kindles one’s passion for their art.

More tomorrow.

Richard

MORE ROCKS

My latest drawing is taking shape.

At 60 x 80cm, it’s rather large for a coloured pencil drawing, but by drawing one rock at a time I have found it a ‘comfortable’ task and one that I can spend small amounts of time on rather than sessions lasting several hours.

This drawing will feature a series of abstract designs, one on each rock.

I hope to complete the drawing this week as I’m heading off to Brickendon on Wednesday to prepare for a drawing involving the Blacksmiths’ Shop.

Richard

ROCK ON

My third major drawing for the year features rocks from the shoreline at Penguin, a seaside town on Tasmania’s North West coast.

This is a large work (80 x 60 cm) and I’m drawing the composition one rock at a time. I have blocked out all of the rocks, but I usually cover the whole drawing with a layer of pencil, then add all the required details.

Today’s image is only a small section of the drawing. Further updates will reveal the scale of this work.

This drawing will feature an array of abstract patterns that I hope will result in a strong, vibrant composition.

Richard

NATURAL ABSTRACTS

Nature provides us with the best examples of abstraction.  Today’s examples are of rock patterns from Penguin, a lovely little town on Tasmania’s NorthWest Coast.

It’s amazing how many compositions one can derive from each rock. Such examples require a lot of decision making and it’s not a matter of copying everything you see. As with all artwork, there needs to be a balance –  a focal point.

There are so many examples available to choose from that one needs to take the time to study what’s available and see the potential in each design.

I source all of my abstract art from Nature, because they are examples of ‘real’, not imaginary art. I like to work with what I know more than what I imagine. For a lot of artists the opposite applies, but this is what makes art so diverse, so unique.

Richard