Abstract painting process

Setting a direction

I am working on some new small paintings. The way I paint involves hope and optimism.

I have no idea how these paintings will develop or what they will become. I just have to trust that I can navigate my way through, one decision at a time. There is a paradox in the painting process I find, it involves both a ‘letting go’ and the tenacity of ‘keeping going’.

Before I began this series, I spent time thinking about the kind of paintings I wanted to create.

I looked back at my sketchbooks and created some studies, thinking about how I wanted these new works to feel. I wrote down a few guiding words; antique embroidery, weird and wonderful vessels, pattern and lines, hidden treasure, spaciousness coupled with complexity.

There is no one way to build a painting

There is no one way to build a painting. My process suits me. I build up layer after layer of richness, colour and paint. Holding my intentions loosely. Responding to what is. Letting go of the plans and perhaps heading in a different direction entirely. I never know how my paintings will turn out until they are finished. I quite enjoy this uncertainty. And these paintings took an unexpected direction…

The layered process

Painting in layers is both a process of discovery and concealment. The ability to add and obscure makes painting with acrylics a dance between flow and frustration. Often, the final painting only really reveals itself in the later stages.

I find that a painting tends to evolve in distinct phases:

1. Play and possibility

The early layers are free and experimental. I tend to start with a single colour ground, just a single colour covering the whole board. Then I add paint marks and coloured shapes. Knowing that only small remnants of these layers may show in the finished work allows for boldness and spontaneity.

2. The messy middle

The painting process can feel like a tussle at this stage. The composition starts to emerge, but the painting oscillates between looking promising and looking lost. It often feels like a wrangle, I have to paint over sections I love to find a composition that works. Some days, I leave the studio feeling like the paintings are worse than when I started, some days everything flows beautifully. This stage always seems to require tenacity and hope.

3. Refinement and resolution

I keep turning up and making one decision after another. Gradually, clarity arrives. The painting begins to make sense, and I shift into refining details, making small adjustments until everything feels in place.

The obstacle is the way

As Marcus Aurelius put it nearly 2000 years ago: “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.”

I welcome the difficult bits and the problem solving involved in creating a painting. The grit makes the pearl. I don’t really want the painting process to always feel easy and simple. I don’t want to know how a painting will turn out before I’ve even started. Sometimes I like the challenge of working through obstacles. The reward is in the overcoming of the difficult bits and developing something that feels good to me.

Capturing wisdom

I take time to reflect as I work and once the paintings are complete. Taking stock. Capturing wisdom. Understanding my own creative process strengthens my intuition and deepens my artistic practice. Here are some questions I ask myself, perhaps they will be helpful to you too:

• What did I learn?

• What worked?

• What do I want to remember for next time?

• What did I enjoy?

• What are my observations on the process?

• What advice do I want to give myself?

To be continued…

Painting is not always a smooth journey, but the good bits and the problem solving are what makes it a meaningful endeavour. It’s in the layers, both the literal ones and in those of experience that we find satisfaction, that we create art that feels like our own, that means something to us.

I will come back and show you how these paintings turned out. I also intend to do another series which is closer to the original indigo and white studies, but let’s see what actually happens…

Materials

These paintings are still works in progress, but were made on 30cm x 30cm wooden panels from Cowling and Wilcox using a variety of paint including: Sennelier Heavy Body Paint, Daler and Rowney FW Ink and Liquitex Soft Body Paint

Tuning into our own wisdom…

In this video I chat through some personal thoughts about the art making process... The things I’d like to remember for myself and which I thought may be useful to also share with you.

I’ve just finished five new paintings. I just love how they turned out, but there were some ups and downs along the way… a little wrangling and a few days of challenge. I find the journey of a painting is not always smooth…

Risk and reward

I had a few days in the studio with all of these paintings where I didn’t love what was happening… I thought that perhaps they would never become finished paintings, sometimes that just happens.

If I am wrestling with a painting I often find that adding something completely different, unexpected, something bold, something uncontrolled helps me to get out of a rut. `Sometimes I need to shake things up,

Introducing a little risk can lead to reward. Perhaps a huge sweep of colour or completely painting over sections… I applied this idea to all of these five paintings. At a certain point in each painting I did something bold and unpredictable…I completely changed the colour palette I was using, I painted right over a whole painting, I applied paint in thick uncontrolled daubs and as soon as I took a bold step, I began to see possibility and began to fall in love with them again.

The grit makes the pearl

I dont really want the painting process to always feel easy and simple. I actually relish the challenge of working through the the difficult days, it is part of what I love about being an artist. I appreciate the problem solving...and try and remember that it is the grit in the oyster that makes the pearl…

Capturing wisdom

After I finish a series of paintings, I try to take a moment to reflect on the process, to take stock, to think through what I did, how I did it and what it felt like. To ask myself a few simple questions as a way to better understand myself as an an artist, as a way to clarify my thoughts and to access my own wisdom.

Learning to tap into and trust our own wisdom is so important as artists. This kind of exercise helps to strengthen that muscle. Here are the type of questions I ask myself incase you’d like to do the same:

• What did I learn?

• What worked?

• What do I want to remember?

• What did I enjoy?

• What are my observations on the process?

• What advice do I want to give myself?

• What must I remember for next time?

Sold out

Original Painting: The Wisdom Tree

Sold out

Original Painting: Deep Roots and Wide Branches

How a painting progresses

I’ve been working on some paintings for the last few weeks. In this blog post I wanted to share these paintings with you and give a little insight into my thought process and painting process.

Quick View

Space to Dream

SETTING AN INTENTION

Before I started painting this series I spent some time thinking about the kind of paintings I wanted to make. I looked back at my sketchbooks and previous painted studies. I made a few notes on how I wanted the paintings to feel and be. Setting the broadest of intentions for the work. I wrote ‘dreamlike, bold, interesting objects.”

I chose to use acrylic paint as I wanted to build up layers of paint and for each painting to have a hidden history which occasionally reveals itself.

I also spent some time thinking about the colour palette.…but this changed in the process of making them. And then I started, My one definite plan was to keep coming back to the paintings day after day until they were finished and to use my sketchbooks as a resource and guide rope.

LAYERS OF PAINT

I built up layer after layer of paint, letting each painting take shape and become what it was going to become. These paintings were painted with Sennelier Abstract Acrylic Paint on 360gsm paper from a UK brand called Seawhite of Brighton.

I find when I work with acrylics in this way, it can be a fascinating journey of both discovery and concealment. The fact you can build up layer after layer is what makes painting with acrylics, for me, a dance between flow and frustration. It’s not until the later layers that the painting comes together and reveals itself.

Quick View

The Spaces Between Things

Quick View

Still Spaces

STAGES OF PAINTING

In creating paintings this way, I seem to cycle through phases of ease and effort. The early layers start with a sense of play and possibility. I freely engage with the colours and paint. As I know that only tiny remnants, if any, of these early layers will show through in the final painting, there is a freedom and boldness that comes at the start.

Then comes the difficult middle bit, where it all looks a bit muddled and messy and I’m not sure what to do next. Each painting seems to oscilate between ugly and good looking so quickly. It’s in this middle phase where I am trying to consider composition and work out the direction of each painting and what it might become.

Quick View

Spacious Blue

This middle phase always seems like a little bit of a tussle, a rewarding wrangle, I have to paint over sections I love to find a composition that works. Each painting frequently looks bad in this phase and I find it hard to believe it could ever become beautiful. But I persevere and keep going. Some days I leave the studio feeling like the paintings are worse than when I started the day. But then the next day everything just comes together and I can see what they might be.

The final phase of my painting process is where I refine, clarify and resolve each painting. Here I make smaller, less dramatic changes until I am happy that all the paintings are how they should be.

As these paintings progressed I kept thinking about making space, the importance of spaciousness, the sentimental importance of the objects we travel through life with….giving myself space to dream and unfurl. And somehow the final paintings do appear a little dream-like to me.

SPACE TO REFLECT

Once I believe they are all complete and finished, I leave them for a few days or more and keep coming back to them to see if I spot anything that jars, or distracts or doesn’t feel exactly right to me.

This time and space to reflect gives me a new perspective and more objectivity, Looking at them long and hard when I’m not in the process of actually painting them is a helpful thing.

And then believing they could be finished turns into knowing they are finished…. and they are.

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