"Rainbow Body" 2018. Oil pastel on painted masonite
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1. Define which techniques you tried and mastered? Struggled?
I tried oil pastel on masonite again for this piece. I was happy with piece #5 which I used the same technique for. I applied a thicker layer of acrylic paint to prime this piece of masonite to allow more texture for the oil pastel to adhere to. I struggled to create a uniform thickness of pastel because I used two brands of pastels with very different binding agents so my warm colors ended up being much less malleable than my cool colors. 2. How did you draw inspiration from other artists techniques or aesthetics in your work? In what ways did you derive meaning or gain historical perspectives from their work? Why these artists? I have been looking at Ron Griswold's paintings for inspiration. What amazes me about his work is the attention to detail, particularly texture. When I had the idea for this piece I thought it would be a really good opportunity to learn to focus on texture and shadow because I was not working with colors that allowed my brain to shade intuitively. Griswold's work fits well with my theme, in an interview he said 'The female form has so much history. When I work with the male form I can get closer to a personal expression without influence." 3. Describe the evolution of your piece. Decisions made. Compositional elements. I started with an outline of the figure in white pencil that indicated several highlights on the form. I started with highlights initially but ended up switching between warm and cool colors as I moved away from the color gradient I had planned on using. I found that in some areas I didn't want to continue using red next to green or yellow next to orange. I realized that as long as there was a change in color it could be perceived as a change in distance from the viewer, it didn't really matter if I followed the colors of the rainbow. 4. If you could consider doing something over, explain why you would do this and what you would do next time? I would test the oil pastels I was using beforehand. I realized that I was using two very different kinds of pastel too late in the game to do anything about it. 5. Elaborate on how this piece links with your other pieces? What is the common thread? This piece is based on the Tibetan Buddhist principle of the "Rainbow Body" which is the most essential nature of a person's being. I am going to try to capture more dark and disgusting aspects of being a man in this year's body of work so I thought I would start off with the concept of true nature and gradually work towards more and more gross manifestations of the human. I was really being an artist(narcissist) when I wrote this, that might not make sense. Yes I gave my first choice school a link to this wow I'm thriving. |