13th of August 2022
I'm glad to say I've finally finished the painting.
I'm rather surprised at myself as the lava person ended up a bit cheesier than I expected: with a lava heart. Nevertheless, the more I look at it, the more complete it seems to me. With pink, red, and the flower of a rose being a traditional symbol of love, exposing the heart of the lava man creates traces of a narrative for the viewer to embellish with their own imagination.
Furthermore, in making the background to the lava man and rose, I came to the realization that what had made the initial white and black background so good was its clear unblurry black and white lines that I was redefining with the white Gelly Roll gel pen. Ergo, I could preserve the high level of polish achieved with the gelly roll pen and the divide that my youngest sister liked so much, by redefining the black lines with a black pen on the other side, instead of filling in the gaps with a white gelly roll.
It's also worth noting that I replaced the moth on the lava person and the cat lady with butterflies. In the case of the lava person, it was because the brown of the moth didn't suit any of the colors on the background - completely throwing off the whole composition. Whilst for the cat lady, it was more that I painted over all the significant parts of the moth, so all I was left with was a yellow blob with eyes emerging from a circle of darkness. My youngest sister hated this and wished that I would paint the fluff of the moth back on. When I was imagining how this may look, I really didn't like what my brain conjured up. Ultimately, I came to the conclusion that this moth's head was unsavable, and it would be better to cover up the moth with a new butterfly.
Of all the butterflies I collected off my wall, I decided the orange, black and white butterfly from the flower fairy card would fit best. The wings are half open, and as such, I feel this butterfly looks just as laid back as the women in the painting. The colors of this new butterfly are also much better suited to the lady and the room she occupies than the bright yellow of the previous moth. Thus I feel that this butterfly is actually an improvement on the initial moth.
One thing that did initially concern me, however, was that since this new butterfly was taken from a card with a depth of 1 or 2 mm. This meant that it rose up from the mountboard high enough to leave a shadow. I tried reducing the incline using black paint and PVA glue, just as I had done with the wrinkles on the lava man, but even this was not sufficient. After some reflection, I was struck by the idea that rather than trying to minimize the incline, I could take advantage and emphasize it. Subsequently, I began cutting up pieces of that original card into little leaf shapes and stuck them with Pritt Stick in place of the antennae of the butterfly. In total, I think I cut 5 leaves, which I ended up painting with several layers of black paint, as I kept noticing inconsistencies in the paint's coverage. It is a surprisingly simple solution in my opinion.
As for the lava person, the replacement butterfly came from a family friend's gift of a butterfly and moth magazine collection. It is just black with a red spot on each wing. There was another butterfly I considered that had red and pink spots on its wings, though I decided against it for several reasons- those being:
> too much pink
> pink did not appear to suit the heat of the lava person
> a solitary red on the wings would bring out the red of the drawing ink in the background
> The butterfly's red spots rhyme visually with the painted red spots elsewhere in the painting.
Another thing I like about the pink background is that, by using a wash of red drawing ink, I preserve the shadow at the forefront of the photograph. In this way, it looks rather like the rose head is casting a shadow on the drawing. Moreover, the receding darkness in the back middle of the drawing makes it look like there is a hidden landscape behind the wall of white.
Looking from the thematic perspective, I was slightly conflicted about the covering of the initial moths, in that it could be perceived as a "mask" - through which people hide their true selves. On the other hand, since this was simply part of the painting and collaging process, it could have been more of a transformation than masking. Something akin to the renewal of cells in the body or planks in the ship of Theseus, or to anthropomorphize some more: learning from one's mistakes and changing as a result over time.
Above the pink background, I also realized the best way to smooth the transition between the pink and leaves of the biome photographs was to create a border of black and then white. The black was easy enough, but the white was both uneven and wobbly in color and shape. Rather than spending hours evening that out, and risking the bar getting wider and wider, I stuck in its place a white sheet of paper with white acrylic paint that was cut to size using a guillotine. Additionally, into the white acrylic paint, I added a bit of the white glittery glue for a bit of pazazz. Unfortunately, the glitter glue I added has not visibly changed the look of the white paint from what I can see, regardless I think it is highly unnecessary to add anything else. It is possible that in some future conditions or lighting, the white acrylic and glitter glue may shine in ways I cannot yet predict.
One alternative idea to smooth out this transition was to paint the leaves with red ink and/or outline them with a white Jelly roll. After some consideration, I felt this may not only add too much white and red but also be a potentially unneeded and irreversible change. In short, this idea was definitely only a last resort. The white card, by contrast, can simply be peeled off.
The last change I can think of that I made when finishing the painting, was adding extra red spots across the painting. I found it was a good way to fill out the excess black and blue space. More importantly, with all of the red being above the red-painted balls it looks like either the red spots are forming into ever more realistic balls as they go down, or the red balls at the bottom are spewing out abstract red spots. Either way, I like the way it looks, and how they work to unify the whole painting. When painting these red spots I also found scarlet watercolor to be the most effective in giving the strongest coverage. In retrospect, I also think these dots may have been in part inspired by the ladybugs and Yayoi Kusama's dotty room. Of all the dots, my favorite is in the white sky of the pink moth painting: it looks like a tiny red sun!
I shall conclude this post with the list of materials (filled out to the best of my knowledge) in my painting/collage, otherwise hitherto known as The Garden:
1. Recycled mountboard
2. Black acrylic paint
3. Standard printer paper
4. Printing ink - for a printer
5. RHS Magazine paper
6. "An ODD Guide to the Leaway" brochure cutout
7. Furniture advertisement
8. Photograph in a magazine of a Mr. Jeremy Fisher sculpture
9. Cutouts from the Laing Gallery brochure in Newcastle upon Tyne.
10. Ladybird Wrapping paper
11. Photographic paper
12. Hamma beads
13. Pink Glittery tape from flying tiger
14. White cartridge paper
15. White acrylic paint
16. White Glittery Appli Glue
17. White Gelly roll pen
18. Orange and Pink Pentel Flourescent Marker S512 Taiwan
19. Pilot G-Tec - C4 Black fineliner
20. PVA glue from Seawhite
21. Scarlet red watercolour paint by Boldmere
22. Lemon Yellow Winsor and Newton watercolour
23. Red Ink by Jackson's
24. Flower Fairy card
25. Tracing paper
26. Lush Catalougue cutouts
27. Jasper John's American flag painting cutouts
28. Leafy wrapping paper
29. Packaging gradient paper by Paydens stationary shop
30. Photographs of:
> Our garden and Wendy house
> My painting of my middle sister in a field that I painted for my GCSE or Alevel
> My drawing of a lizard from my Fantastic and Strange GCSE project
> My biome made for Alevel Biology - now sunbleached
> My biome made for Alevel Biology - now with black marker outlines
Appendix:
Johns, Jasper. Flag. Jasper Johns. MoMA, 1954. https://www.moma.org/collection/works/78805.
Kusama, Yayoi. Exhibition 'Berlin-Tokio/Tokio-Berlin - The Art of Two Cities'. Bridgeman Images, 2006. https://www.bridgemanimages.com/en/noartistknown/exhibition-berlin-tokio-tokio-berlin-the-art-of-two-cities/photo/asset/2727464.
Comments
Post a Comment