new digs, new sale, new project

new digs:

The Front Gallery represents my work in Edmonton, AB.  They've just moved into a new space and it looks gorgeous!  I haven't been up to see it yet, but hope to make the trip within a month or so.

Here's a brief news clipping about the move.


new sale:

Kurbatoff Gallery represents my work in Vancouver, BC.  They have just made the first sale of one of my "Snapshot" paintings!  This is the one which sold:

Intersection
acrylic and mixed-media stitching on canvas
39 x 56"

Hooray!  I had begun to wonder if there was any merit in these photo-based works...  yes, I know artistic merit is not necessarily indicated by sales, but.

new project:

I have been invited to paint/alter some hard hats for a ground-breaking ceremony at cSPACE in Calgary, where construction is soon to begin at the old King Edward School location.  

Today I worked on the first hat:

I've never done anything with hard hats before!  So I had to research a bit about the materials of the hard hat and what I could use on it that would be reasonably permanent.

I decided to sand it, drill holes in it, scratch its surface.  Then I struck out into un-researched territory and rubbed graphite into it and sprayed it with a clear sealing coat.  This is a test run - tomorrow I will do a scratch test.

If this doesn't work out, I will be able to use oil paint to stain the surface, which will be very permanent based on some earlier testing I did.  I hope the graphite works, though, because I really like how its sooty look is reminiscent of a miner's hat.  A rather pretty miner's hat.

coming and going

This week I sent off the work which will be in the upcoming exhibition at the Front Gallery in Edmonton.  It will be the main public exhibition of the Multiple Suites; I'm feeling excited and also a bit nervous.  Going out:

In the studio a new piece is coming along.  Below, sidelighting really shows off the stitching:

Thinking about potential shapes and colours:

And this piece:

has undergone some improvement:

Feels better now.

rhythm

Quite awhile since I made a blog post.  I've been doing a bit of writing in the last few weeks, and have spent a bit less time in the studio.  

While in the studio, I've been engaged in the processes for completing work, such as final coats of clear medium and varnish, finishing edges, wiring backs, updating the inventory book - all those little things that need to be done to make the work gallery-ready.

The writing has been focussed on a residency application for ArtScape, and also on collecting my thoughts in preparation for finding another gallery.  Since AXIS closed I have not made any inquiries into a replacement gallery, feeling I needed to give my work some space to develop without pressure.  This proved to be a very good decision for the first half of 2014 - but now it begins to feel like procrastination.  The time has come to make some forays.

It's an interesting rhythm of solitary studio time interspersed with the need to communicate and get the work out there.

And now for some pretty pictures.  :)

Went out painting last weekend.  Photographing the process did not even occur to me at the time! - but I did photograph the finished work on location:

Above: in the field.

Below: tweaked a bit after returning home.

The main change was to the line of trees at lower left.  Also made some subtle changes in the middle bit - reduced the curvy mown-field lines and some small adjustment to the middle trees.

And a nice view of fence posts across the road from where I was painting.

In the studio, besides gallery-ready work, there are 2 new "Snapshot" pieces underway.  Number 15:

initial sketch

stitched & stretched

and ... pause

While that one is on pause, I begin #16:

"Edifice" initial sketch

some layout

stitched and stretched and ready for painting

Probably because I'm feeling pressure to find another gallery and have not yet done so, in this last month I've felt like I've accomplished next to nothing.  Making this entry, I see that is not true.  

Hmmm.  So here we have two important functions of maintaining this blog, hey: it keeps things in perspective, and it keeps me focussed on what I need to do.

Until next time,

:)

V

snapshots

After spending 6 months focussed on making purely abstract work, I needed a change.  So here is an about-face: working with photographic imagery again.  The "Snapshots" series continues!  

About a year ago I had some photos printed with the intention of working them into paintings, but then I lost steam on the urban stuff.  Everything just seemed to deflate and there I was, floating in a creative void.  What an anxious feeling!  I wondered if that was it; it was a good run but urban work was a thing of the past for me.  

Not so, apparently.  A new piece:

drawing

layout

Intersection
acrylic and mixed-media stitching on canvas
56w x 39h inches

There are things I like and things I don't like about "Intersection", but I'm setting it aside for now.

A piece begun months ago, finished this week.  This is the only photo I have of it at the moment, skewed, taken at an angle:

Hmm, not a bad composition with the strong angled lines; perhaps this will inform the next painting.

And a piece made half-heartedly last year:

Reworked:

East Meets West
acrylic and mixed-media stitching on canvas
64w x 39h inches

I'm liking "East Meets West" a lot better now.  The re-working veered away from my original intent, which is good - keeps me on my toes.  It may be finished... set aside for now.

Working in the studio this week, I realize it's been a couple of years since I felt this excited about making urban-themed paintings.  Now I am feeling eager and curious as to where these "snapshots" will lead!

And, interestingly, I also want to continue with some of the pure-abstraction ideas I worked up over the last 6 months.  First, however, this other exploration.  I think that by moving back and forth in this way the two directions will inform and expand one another.

get back

Then:

New series under construction, December 30, 2013

Now:

Snapshot #9: Direction
mixed media on stitched canvas
19.25w x 36.25h inches

Snapshot #10: Priority
mixed media on stitched canvas
33w x 17.25h inches

Snapshot #11: Someone Pushed It
mixed media on stitched canvas
33w x 17.25h inches

Snapshot #12: K4A Anonymous
mixed media on stitched canvas
33w x 16.75h inches

Not sure that they are all complete...  but liking them a lot at this point.  

So far I've started this year with these "Snapshot" series, then I jumped over to starting some more abstract works (see previous post), then I travelled to visit my mum for a week, and now I've jumped back to the "Snapshots"... and in between I made a couple of portraits and one plein air landscape painting.

Funny thing: when I talk with other artists they invariably tell me that they focus on one thing at a time.  This one thing could be a style of painting with various subjects, or an ongoing exploration of one subject using various styles.  

I did spend several years focussed on one thing - the "Ecosystems" paintings which were made with oil glazes on stitched canvas, and I did get very good at making them.  However, since switching to acrylics a few years ago, I have developed a habit of jumping back and forth between several ideas and painting styles simultaneously.  Lately I have been wondering whether, in doing so many things at once, I run the risk of becoming the proverbial "jack of all trades and master of none".

In the end I tell myself that this jumping between and across ideas and styles should be viewed in the context of a lifetime spent painting, and in the context of cyclical explorations (since each time I return to an idea or style it is with added information from the other things I work on in between), and then it makes more sense, the whole lifelong endeavour of my work does show a continuity of development.

And after all, I only have this one life.  May as well spend it engrossed in lifelong exploration of the visual languages.