WIP

Chugging away on the final piece for Bad Movie Rerun.

Bad Movie Rerun

Here is 'my' side of the postcard Josh and I are getting printed up for our show.

First work of 2013

Here are some progress shots of my first finished work of 2013.

18"x 24"Acrylic on Canvas.

Creepy Doll (Baby New Year)

I tried some white on black monotypes on the last day of 2012. This one, using a baby doll for reference, was the only one I liked. It ranks up there with the creepiest art I have ever done.

Monotypes

Took the day to experiment with more monotypes. This time I used black oil paint on the Gelli Arts gelatin block instead of acrylic and I'm much happier with the results. On all of these I used a soft rubber brayer to roll a coat of paint onto the gelatin block and pulled paint off with cotton swabs, rubber tipped paint shapers, and paper towels. Overall I'm quite satisfied with the results. Took about 2 hours to do all of these, not counting cleanup. These are really just proof of concept and I really want to continue to explore this technique.

30 of 30

Well I really meant to post more here as I progressed on the 30 Day Art Challenge but (insert excuse here). Regardless, I got everything done in time. This year I treated the month more like a sketchbook than a cohesive project/series. I tried new techniques, new tools, and new materials. And I had a lot of fun with it. While I'm not happy with everything I think I learned something with each piece and I'm motivated to do more at a larger scale.

Here they are in all their glory.

This is one of my favorites. The background texture was created with a Catalyst Blade which is basically a rubber fingered brush. The white was applied by doing a gelatin print transfer using real gelatin - it didn't take me long to realize I did not like the synthetic gelatin block for printing to canvas board.

This is another gelatin monotype. You will notice that this, along with the next two feature my favorite color combination of green and red. It is not easy to use that combo without evoking a feeling of Christmas but I think I've pulled it off.

I want to do a 36" by 48" version of this one at some point in the near future. At this point I had abandoned the gelatin printing. The base sketch was done in blue gel pen which works great as a guide over dark colors.

This may be my favorite of the bunch and was #29 of 30. I will be doing a larger scale series of these I think.

1 of 30

Once again this year, I have signed up for the 30 Day Art Challenge. Today I picked up my canvases and got started, with the goal of prepping a few with gesso and finishing at least one piece. With that in mind, here a few shots from today.

In the background you can see my first prepped canvas. In the foreground, a sketch from a life drawing session that I put on a template that I plan to use as a guide for each piece of art.

Here I have placed a 6x6 inch Gelliarts gel printing plate over the guide image and started putting down some acrylic paint.

Above you can see the painted gel block. It was tough to tell how much coverage I had so...

...I slipped a blank piece of paper between my guide drawing and the gel block. I decided that the coverage was a little wonky in places so I cleaned up a few spots but neglected to take any pictures. Once the gel block painting was where I wanted it, I pressed my canvas board down on the block.

DISASTER! This was the first time I had used the Gelliarts gel block and my first pull was terrible. The paint was too dry and the canvas didn't create a stronger bond to the paint than the gel block so most of the paint did not come off. Fortunately my template under the block had an 8 x 10 inch registration box around it so I could easily align the canvas panel for more impressions. Instead of painting the entire image, I began quickly painting in a section here and there and quickly re-pressing the panel to it. In the end, it took about six pressings, including the failed first to get the image to a point I was happy with it.

Here is the end result. Not bad for trial and error. I'll try a few more with the Gelliarts block and see how it goes. I need to use brighter, richer colors for my under tones as this is coming off a little flat. Hopefully I can figure out a way to get this technique working a little better, otherwise I may be back to making my own gel plate with Knox gelatin - which I know works well with canvas panels.

Tomorrow I will finish another painting. And it will be an improvement over this one.

From the Sketchbook

Another acrylic sketchbook painting.

Started with some loose lines from a Tombow brush pen. I then picked out the lines I wanted to keep with pencil and washed over the whole thing with acrylic paint which erased most of the lines I didn't need. After that it was just a matter of adding layers of acrylic paint.

Digital Doodle

30 min in PhotoShop with Wacom. No reference.

Xmas with Gill.

What can I say, I love monsters.

And since I was doodling this around Christmas time, I started thinking about what kind of a gift the Creature from the Black Lagoon would want.

Kay Lawrence was just not the right girl for him.

Column

My wife took one look at the sketch and said "you should name him Column." So I did.

The sketch started with a light gray Tombow brush pen followed by pencil and graphite stick to pick out the final shapes.

Then I went over it with two shades of Formula P3 acrylic paint - Coal Black for the darks (which is really a very dark blue) and Morrow White for the highlights.

Here is the final sketchbook page.

Creating a Character from a Scribble

To start this page in my sketchbook I used a light gray Tombow brush pen and just scribbled a bunch of lines in a random pattern. From there I started to imagine shapes in the pattern with no real plan for what my finished piece was going to be. I saw a few ways to do some crazy faces and began drawing over the gray lines with a pencil. When I had a drawing I liked I darkened in the lines with a darker brush pen.

I used a brown acrylic wash to go over the drawing. Since this was the first time I had used this combination of mediums I was quite surprised that the wash pretty much erased the lines I had put down with the Tombow pens. Fortunately my pencil lines remained and I layered Formula P3 acrylic paint on top of them.

Most of the work was done in warm tones and for the final touch I added some complimentary blue into the eyes and background to make the character pop a bit more.

This was a good exercise. I'm quite happy with the results despite the fact that I had no real inspiration when I started the sketch. Truthfully I'm already working on another one.

Experimenting with techniques

I'm playing around with some techniques in preparation for a larger painting.

I started out with a life drawing I did a couple weeks earlier. I think this is a five minute pose.

I printed the drawing on craft paper, soaked it in water, and mounted it on a 8 x 10 board with acrylic gel medium. Once it was completely dry I went back and refined the line drawing with pen and ink. Currently I am layering in tones with acrylic paint. Obviously it is not finished.

When I use this method again I will probably put a coat of acrylic gel medium over the paper after the pen and ink step to prevent the acrylic paint from absorbing into the paper. I will see this piece through to the end though so I'm not quite sure what I would change just yet.

Sketchbook 11•22•11

Did another drill in ink and white acrylic. No pencil = no erasing. Approximately one hour.

New Drawings

Finally got back to Wednesday figure drawing. Below are a few highlights from this week.

A couple days later I did some exercises using Speedball ink, nib-pens, and a brush. No pencil. No erasing. I did a few touchups with white acrylic but nothing major. These were done from photographic reference.

30 Days - 30 Paintings

Yep, that's them. Every single painting I did for the 30 Day Art Challenge. I have recently been attending some life drawing sessions and found myself struggling with faces. That was the catalyst to do this series of 30 portraits - practice my faces. There are a few I love. There are a lot with potential. And there are a couple that I can barely look at without cringing. But as a collection I am proud of what I have done. I definitely got better at faces (painting skills aside, all my drawings of the portraits were solid). And I will be in line in 2012 to do it all over again.

Cheers - Ed

30 Day Art Challenge Update

Wow, I had really intended to post more during the 30 Day Art Challenge that I'm participating in but here I am at day 25 and this is my first post. Oh well, I've definitely gotten a lot done which has left little time for blogging.

Here we have the line art I used to transfer on to the canvas along with the final canvas. The first drawing for each portrait was done very small. I then scanned in the drawing, sized it to fit the 8 x 10 canvas, and printed it out. I then used a light box to do the final correct scale line drawing and transferred it to the canvas by rubbing the back with a graphite stick and then drawing over the front with it taped down to the canvas board.

In the shot above you can see two more portraits in progress. I'm working on these in a somewhat assembly line style. Although it is already day 25 of the challenge I only have seven completed drawing. However, I have them all at the point where there is maybe an hour of work each to finish the last 23. Still, that's a lot of painting to do in the next five days!

And last, this is a final piece - one of the seven so far. I really hope to starting turing these out fast.

I will post more soon and start promoting for the December 1st show opening once everything is finished up.

This is my winning entry to the Cemetery Dance New Screams chapbook cover contest. No details on the publication schedule, but it was a fun little project. Only spent about 6 hours on this. I would like to see what I can do if I take more time.

Did a quick portrait from photo reference (thanks Suicide Girls!) using pencil with pen and ink overtop. This is a drawing style I'm trying out for the 30 Day Art Challenge which is approaching fast. So far I like the result. Will likely end up a full blown painting.

If all goes as planned, this blog will start to get quite busy. I will be flexing my creative muscles over the next month in preparation to do 30 painting in 30 days. I've also gone back to figure drawing for the first time in 10 years. I'm a little rusty but here is the best image of my first session.