You Name It I

You Name It I, 8x8 in., canvas and mixed media

With this piece I am announcing a sub-project to go along with some of my more kitschy collage pieces I have started working on. Each piece has specific meanings to be because I composed them. Some are very directed and others are more ambiguous. Point being, each piece will have a different meaning to each viewer. I want the audience to name the pieces. For the final title, I will either randomly draw from a collection of titles or I will choose my favorite. I would love ideas to be posted on the blog! I would also like to plan a preview party for the first time these pieces are exhibited. This is a plan just beginning to form so bare with me as I test it out. The idea spurred from Anne mentioning another artist doing title parties, so I cannot take credit for the original idea. If I can find her I will link her. So, be my guest, try a title!

This collage I put together during one of the first night at my LillStreet class. I concocted it from a book about a little boy going to the zoo and seeing dinosaurs. I am pulling in my work with the female figure, some of that work I will post soon. At first the raw canvas behind the collage really bothered me but I think adding anything might take away from the simplicity of the composition.


Some of my favorite highlights from this piece: 1) The figure is composed of a stone sidewalk. 2) The bird in the upper right corner. 3)The headless but not figure.

Name it!

Pear

Pear, 28x32 in., acrylic and mixed media, 2008

This painting is composed with acrylic paint and collage. I used the lines of the text from the collage to build the pear figure. Acrylic paint to a new adjustment for me right now and I have been using a lot of string gel which is a thick, puffy paint like substance that gives the acrylic paint for body and transparency. It is a great stepping stone.


Process pictures are a fantastic way to keep track of how my work is evolving and to learn from my process. More often than not I like the painting most somewhere in the process part opposed to the final product. I like the rawness of the process, its more honest. In the end I did not do a great job of embracing the under-painting/collaging. I think that is part of my adjustment back to acrylic. I am used to being able to beat down the oil paint, it is much more flexible. Acrylic kind of sticks and stays. Each piece is a learning process.

Here are a couple of close up shots so that you can appreciate the details. The close up on the left gives you a view of the collage
pages. You can see the text lines embracing the contour of the pear. Sometimes collage is the only piece in a painting that saves it technically, in regards to form.


To the right shot gives a detail of the stem. I used a purple floral print for the collage part. The string gel is pretty this in this part giving it some texture.