"From the shores of Gitche Gumee..." these first two works are a step back, or sideways. I have to admit I feel great pressure when I paint and it is almost never enjoyable. I don't know if it's school or the idea of showing my work to one of the greatest living landscape artists alive (to my mentor's credit, she never ever comes off this way, she has been nothing but helpful and insightful), but it is a daily struggle. It might be just the difficulty of continuing to push myself.... regardless, I am painting at least 20 hours week, usually more, and continuing to work bigger, with more layers/glazes, and trying to build on the success of last semester. So these first two works are more like what I was doing in the second semester. I wanted to find out what I enjoyed about working like this, and what can I bring to my more "school-minded" works. The work above was totally inspired by one of April's paintings from my visit in July which featured a large centrally placed full moon. Mine is waning... or perhaps waxing.
Magic hour on Lake Calhoun.
Jeffrey Ebeling was kind enough to provide me with some small canvases to experiment on. It's oil ground on linen and canvas respectively. Hannah Barrett provided the small gessoed panel. How better to explore the different surfaces than to do the exact same painting on each?
The figure and the bamboo forrest continue to move slowly and continue to be a challenge. These are more like what I want to have ready for school in January. Ominous. I understand in these more what April talked about to me in July. In her works she talked about a certain "speed" things had. Some parts moved faster, some slower. These are both very slow. Solemn. Maybe too slow. I am not sure how to speed them up as it were.
