Once in a while I have to make art in a way that is contrary or unlike what I normally do. On Sunday, May 18th, I was invited to participate in an art show June 1 – 13 in Baton Rouge. That gave me two weeks to have art ready to hang. Whatever I did had to be a quick process. In conjuring up ideas I decided I wanted to try more masculine colors. By that I mean more browns.
As I started arranging my compositions, I found myself going back to grids in order to structure my works. Only this time, I made them less uniform. As I rendered the pieces, I soon found myself annoyed at the most extreme of these works, a gouache painting. Gee, I reached the total other end of the spectrum from my earlier days of splattered paintings. Oh, I did make one non-grid piece with masculine colors.
Having vowed to go as speedily as possible, I ended up more anal in the way I worked. My process this time was more like working a jigsaw puzzle. I used to love solving those, too. As for what next, I’m not sure. It was a rush to push myself like that, but I prefer to go slower and take some time to work through a piece.
Have you found any tricks to snap yourself out of "anal" thinking? It's my problem pretty much all the time. I am too uptight and analytical. I might try some impressionist style projects to loosen me up. I wish I could go abstract like you but I am so darn uptight, I at least have to stay in the realm of representational art.
ReplyDeleteliz:
ReplyDeleteWorking loosely has never been a problem for me. I guess the easiest way to loosen up is to hold your pencil/paintbrush from the eraser/pointy end in order to draw/paint. Have you ever made gesture drawings? You draw a simplified quick sketch of person who is posing – get their body gesture without worrying about detail.
Mo : )