Painting Blind: instinctually painting from memory

I saw an extremely vague image of calvary the last time I went to church. It was an amazing image that I could barely decipher but it has stuck with me.

The colors were rich and vivid and they streamed across the canvas in varying complementary and discordant hues. Some parts appeared very clear and other pieces were just barely evident.

I have worked in the past from memory but in recent series I prefer to have some reference image. This time was almost completely from memory and even the memory was vague.

It’s a feeling that you are  painting as the image paints itself, it is an awkard feeling that forms from some divine place. If you think too much you start muddying up the colors, you must have a feeling that whatever color or detail needs to be perfected you will instinctually know it.

It’s a very different feeling from the deliberate act of painting a clearly planned vision. Instinct and faith are the only tools I have when painting blind. Next post is about painting deliberately about an upcoming group of paintings I will describe.

Return to the Artist Studio

The Celebration: 3rd in a series of 3

Last night I finally started painting again. The excitement and inspiration spilled over into the next day. It is a liberating feeling after being stifled for so long and suddenly it all makes sense.

I think the only negative is that suddenly there are more ideas, images and concepts than I can get done in the time available. This is when my lists get overwhelming.

I first started on the third in a series of swallow paintings. The work is smaller than the two previous but more detailed, with a larger population of swallows than the previous paintings.

Calvary

The name of the work is the celebration, it is a scene from a local bridge in Rowlett after the spring rain. I saw a swarm of swallows that surrounded the bridge and flew under and around the structure. There was a feeling of excitement; nature in celebration, the drought was finally over.

The second painting I work on was a brand new painting called calvary The last time I went to church, I had an amazing image of calvary surrounded by stained glass. This is going to be one of my most colorful paintings and it is a bit of a departure from previous works.

I’m very excited about finally getting back to work and I can’t wait to see the new views as they become real.

First in a Series of 3

Second in a Series of 3

The illusive inspiration

We are offered only glimpses,

deconstructed pieces of thought,

tangents of vague images.

They dangle just beyond our grasp

The creative must be patient,

Disciplined enough to wait

For clarity

Trusting enough to know

it’s only a matter of time

we follow the subconscious into the shadow

Out of our safe space

Into unknown places where ideas have many different facets

Like diamonds they wait

Beneath stone

they are barely discernable until they fully form

and once we see just a glimpse of what we seek

all we desire is more’

more facets of the unseen form

more hiding places for the idea

for lessons in the shadows

wisdoms in the dark

and after each valley, we wait

for that voice to clearly speak again

it has no color, no form nor name

all we know after each plateau

we’re never again the same…

I keep going in the studio, looking for that feeling and for some reason I just can't paint in oils, it's too committed and I feel anxious, unable to settle in. I've been using pastels, they are quick and easier to pick up and put down.

I know when the feeling intensifies, there will be no stopping nor delaying painting but for now, I'm just on the edge of inspiration. I am starting to get images, clear images that have seemed illusive until now.

I am painting the third in the series of large oils, the swallows, although this one is the smallest one and the most atmospheric and detailed of the three. It is called the celebration and it's a swarm of swallows mingling with dark clouds in the distance.

Another painting is Calvary, it was an immediate inspiration and just stalled terribly. There are rich colors of stained glass and strange skies that are a bit out of my normal palette of colors.

I'm also painting a scene from under water from literally thirty or more years ago when I was scuba diving off the coast of New Jersey. The problem is capturing under water from memory but also the deep richness of intense ultramarine blue. You can see why I have stalled, it's either there or it's not, there is no faking it.

A slow and anxious series of work

It’s been a long difficult road, trying to connect inspiration with action. I’ve been in a holding pattern for too long with the latest series of  paintings.

It has always gone this way, the more developed the new approach to painting is, the longer the interim between series. This particular series has had many different styles and ideas, it’s complexity is also a probable stumbling block to actually starting and finishing recent paintings.

What seems to be the overall theme is night scenes, wildlife sketches and windows. I want to put the viewer in various positions looking through windows. Another aspect of the new works is strange perspectives-from beneath the ocean and from the eye of a 10 old child that just lost his dad.

My intent is a more personal approach with a  description for each painting. The new series will start replacing the old paintings on www.artbygordon.com. I am also in the process of photographing older paintings to be available on Fine Art America as large prints.

I hope to have more of a steady flow of paintings soon. Stay tuned.

Return to the Studio

I've been doing a lot of standing in front of canvas and pastels, surveying them and trying to get back into painting and nothing. Today I broke that trend and I can't say enough how much it felt like getting back to an amazing place you never realized how much missed.

I started with pastels and the idea was to just enjoy it, not too many details, not too much care, just enough to get the idea across. It was an enjoyable afternoon as the images again spoke and directed themselves.

The first pastel is an ocean scene-a very uncomfortable kayak ride complete with sharks and swells so high it felt like we were skiing. I also lost a fishing rod and was showed how much I haven't mastered kayaking the surf-see A seasoned kayaker is bested.

 I am still finishing the image but wanted to try and keep the basic idea of movement and water without making it too detailed and overworked. The feeling I was trying to convey is the feeling of being one with the giant swells and yet the feeling that you could be discarded with little effort as I later discovered. Ocean 1, kayaker 0-by the way my brother, nephew and son all came into the shore without being tossed out of their kayaks-it was quite embarrassing for me.

The next pastel I worked on was an old one of Lake Texoma-when you are out there on a clear day, the sky and water are so pristine. This was from the time before last when the water was so still and the sky was just an amazing deep blue. We didn't even catch anything but being out there is sometimes all we need to feel that moment of, it doesn't get much better than this-that was one of those perfect, pristine days.

The last pastel I worked on didn't get that far but I do like the basic idea. It is a fire from past weekend at Beavers Bend Oklahoma. I liked the way the light lit up the trees and I wanted to capture the forest with a feeling of mystique. I look forward to perfecting the depth and the atmosphere while leaving much of the details to the viewers imagination.

I am excited about finally getting back to the studio even if it's just for a few hours. I really enjoyed getting out to Hagerman National Refuge and between finally getting to feel better and having a bit of nature for inspiration, I think the spark is back. I can't wait to get some of the images that have been sketched out to be real. Stay tuned.

Spring at Hagerman: Let the inspiration begin

The redbuds and dogwoods are competing, each flickering tapestry of buds climbing higher into the forest branches desperate to be noticed. The daffodils burn like small yellow fires in the rich green edges of highways.

Even while the sky twists and rolls over itself, spring wrestles with winter. The blinding light of the late afternoon sun shows me spring will inevitably win.

There are buds all along the tree line, in pale pink and gold, green and yellow-you can’t see any leaves, they are just barely ghostly shadows of what’s to come.

I’m excited, I can smell the flower breath of the breezes, the thin hush of winter rolling like tumbleweed over the exposed fields. Winter has barely ended and spring insists, it grabs it palette, reaches for its brushes.

While my studio sits cold in the late winter thaw, all the paintings from previous series are like snippets of distant photos I can barely discern. With the coming of spring, I am excited about a new canvas, about a new swatch of color that streams through the landscape daring me to explain, how spring renews all hope and how my colors and passion is just a season away.

I love the spring…