Melancholic Woman

Melancholic Woman

Oil on Canvas Paper

210/270mm

With this work I was drawing from a few different influences, specifically Evelyn William’s brand of expressionism, as well as Picasso’s blue period, and early Russian Christian art. This kind of Noir lighting is a big step away from my usual style, where I mostly try to employ even light. There is also an intentional distortion of certain facial features, most notably the enlargement of the eyes and shrinking of the mouth. The use of straight lines, as opposed to curves, for the eyebrows and bridge of the nose was also intended to help intensify the feeling of the piece.

Recent Experiments in Style and Technique

Pensive Face

Oil on Oil Painting Paper

210/275mm

With this technique I am attempting to minimalise detail, and use the graphic power of  intense lighting in black and white. It is very inspired by the expressions on Byzantine mosaic portraits. Also you will notice the enlarged eyes and the closeness to the eyebrows.

Left hand #1

Acrylic on Panel

160/225mm

This is my first try at using a palette knife. I did end up using a little brush work as well. The idea is that it will be easier on my rheumatism, and strain the hand less than using a brush. Also, it should allow me to incorporate a more expressionistic style. My left hand was the obvious subject matter.

 

My First Painting with Water Mixable Oil Paint

I have done a lot of oil painting in the past, but it was always with toxic solvents, and as I became more health conscious, I wanted to stop that practice, and use acrylics instead. I hated the fact that acrylics always dried up too quickly, so if you spend all that time mixing a skin tone or something, it’ll dry out in no time, so if you want to keep that colour workable, you’re forced to use a retarding medium, which gives the paint a goopy consistency.

Part of the joy of painting, for me, is the unintended effects, and intuitive fun you can have due to the paint remaining workable on the surface of the piece. I heard of water mixable oil paints last year, and so, read various reviews on the net about peoples’ experiences with them. You can never really know until you give it a try, so I purchased a tube of black and white, with the intention of using water to thin the paint for the initial layers, and then linseed oil as the medium for subsequent layers.

It felt so good to be painting with oils again!

Study with Water Mixable Oils

Portrait of Female Model

Oil on Primed Cardboard

200/250mm