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Artist statement

My concept this project has been kept loose to be my process of making art. I really wanted to use the time we had left to explore and learn more about painting. I think I've learned a lot from the colour theory classes I attended. I also like the loose and experimental work I did at the start of the project. The simple line drawings were just as fun as the longer paintings I worked on.

My primary sources were mostly the work I was making, my reflection, my friends and the objects around me.

If I had six more weeks, I would have liked to incorporate what I've learnt about compliementary colours into my own work.

Artists Researched:

Paula Rego

Lucian Freud

Walter Sickert

Karin Hanssen

Yuma Tomiyasu

Lars Elling

Laura Lancaster

David Hockney

Jackson Pollock

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Karin Hanssen

The Approach (Donald Duck)

Hanssen is another artist I found in the library. She paints primarily with oil paint. Her works are blended out and crisp with the forms and colours.

The Preparation, 2021

I was drawn to her work because of their eerieness. Her paintings usually focus on human interaction whether that be in the public or private sphere. She draws inspiration from public photographic sources from the 1950s to the 1970's.

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Tuesday 23rd April

After yesterday's charcoal drawing, I wanted to paint. My original plan was to paint in full colour but after sketching I decided to paint in ink. I chose to stand up as I liked how the mirrors didn't capture my full figure, it jumps from my face to my torso then to my legs.

I sketched in the mirrors and then a rough outline of my features and figure as I went. I used a thick paintbrush for the darkest parts with concentrated ink. I then used a smaller paintbrush for details and a light wash of ink for shading.

The mirror set up was the same as yesterday, I had both my sketch and yesterday's drawing up while I worked. I like these two pieces as a set, I think they work better together so when I hang my work up I'll put them next to each other.

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Monday 22nd April

I had a set up of three mirrors on an easel for this self portrait. I put card on the wall underneath my paper so the bumps on the wall wouldn't interfere with the charcoal.

I did some thumbnail sketches until I found one I liked. The one I chose was long and skinny so I could show all the mirrors.

I sketched one to scale as a reference for the actual work. I taped it to the wall next to the paper I was working on. It was two A3 pages.

I hadn't used charcoal like this in a while so it was really fun. I started from the top down. The tights were the most interesting to draw. I smudged it with my finger then went back in with an eraser to show where the tights looked sheer.

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Colour chart exercise

I painted ny own colour chart following a photocopy Sylvia had given me. I think this exercise was the most beneficial out of all I've done. It taught me so much about colour mixing through me doing it myself and experimenting. I did this on A3 size paper.

I had trouble with it when I started, until I copped that I had been using a crimson red which gave me quite dark colours. The first two purples were me figuring out the process and were done with the crimson red which I think made them so dull. I switched to cadmium red and it made them much brighter.

I made notes of what colours I used as I went along. I used ultramarine blue for the blues and purples on the left. The other colours I used were just cerulean blue, cadmium red, yellow and white for the tints. I used complimentary colours to darken the tones.

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Friday 19th April

This morning I started my copy of Lucian Freud's painting. I taped the photocopy above my page on the drawing board so I could see it well and easily.

Sylvia reccomended this exercise as Freud uses lot's of colours to make his skin tones. I had tried this exercise with his portrait of the Queen but never finished it.

I started by sketching out all the features and making it as accurate as I could. This took until our break at 11am. I wanted to make sure it was correct as the last time I rushed into it and the painting was thrown off because it was not a good foundation.

The background colour took time to figure out as it was similar to the tones of her face but more yellow. I started blocking in colours on her face, I found this challenging as I had to lay down each tone individually. I still don't know how he got his colours to blend like that, mine came out quite bold and blocky. I think it's because he paints with thick layers of oil paint on canvas whereas I'm using acrylic on 300gsm paper.

I painted in the hair colour but ended up using my palette knife to get the swipes of colour in.

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Laura Lancaster

Lancaster uses found photographs, slides and home videos as the starting point for her paintings.

Untitled, 2014

I think you can see these images in an new light through the way she paints, it's bright and colourful but eerily nostalgic or tense. There's a dreamlike chaos to her interpretations.

Spectre (2019)

She works primarily in oil and acrylic on canvas and linen. The paint is pushed onto the canvas forcefully and seems to melt of the page. I think it conveys how memory can melt with time.

Bearsuit, 2012 (oil on linen)

In an interview, Lancaster said, "I make a lot of drawings and work on photocopies which focusses my intent for each image and allows the paintings themselves to become very loose and rapidly executed."  I think this is a really interesting way to work.

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Thursday 18th April

Today we did a portrait colour study. I wore a green top so I could explore it's effect on the tones of my face.

This was my set up, I had a drawing board on my easel for the painting and had another easel set up with a mirror. I taped up red and green paper. The red would make the green pop and the green would make make my green top fade into the wall.

I started with thumbnail sketches to pick my compostition then lightly sketched out my features in pencil.

It took ages for me to figure out how to mix the colours I wanted. I spent a long time on this. I also ended up moving my features as I realised the proportions were wrong.

I made the side of my face nearest the red paper have more red in the tones I mixed. The green top was reflecting green onto my chin and neck so I added a pale green there. I also picked up the green tinge on my face from the paper. I exaggerrated the colours for fun and I really liked them. Something about the face reminds me of Paula Rego's work.

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Tuesday afternoon

Before lunch, we set up the still life and I sketched out the fruit. This was my second time doing the workshop but I wanted to try again and apply what I had learnt last time.

I was careful to paint in the shadows on the white of the page but forgot to do that for the walls. I was more confident when mixing colours this time.

I think I was able to pick up the colours I was seeing better. For example, I could see cool tones almost that appeared almost green in the shadow of the orange from the wall. I also mixed in a touch of orange for the shadows on the blue wall.

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These were my notes for presenting, I had some information that I didn't put in the actual powerpoint that was easier to just talk about.

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Tuesday 16th April

My powerpoint on Jackson Pollock that I presented this morning.

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Monday 15th April

Life painting with Sylvia

Today we were working with complimentary colours. We used no white paint just added varying amounts of the complimentary cour to lighten or darken our tones. It took me ages to sort out my tones, I had first tried mixing a purple but realised it was too similar to the tones I had already mixed in previous classes so I changed to a blue.

I chose an ultramarine blue and used orage to darken it. I was really surprised to see how dark orange could make the blue, it was so dark it looked black. It looks different on camera than in real life, I think it looks better on camera. It's interesting how the orange painting below makes the blue of my painting seem so vibrantly blue. I think the blue painting above it creates a seamless feeling of calm as you look at them both on the wall.

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Lucian Freud

1. Queen Elizabeth II

2. Head of a Girl, 1976

Lucian Freud is an artist who I've been looking at. I've copied two of his paintings and I've learned a lot from observing the colours he uses in skin tones. I also like how he applies paint.

Girl in a Striped Nightshirt, 1983-85

He's known for his figuratives paintings and portraits. He worked only from life and spent many hundreds of hours capturing a person's essence. He was friends with Francis Bacon and admired the artist Jack B.Yeats' work. He uses oil paint on canvas. He layers the paint to give it a rich, buttery look. I do really admire the way he uses colour.

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Thursday afternoon

In the afternoon, we did copies of Lucian Freud paintings. The way he paints skin is fascinating, it's a completely unflattering portrait but there' something so interesting about it that you forgive him for it . I picked this portrait of the Queen to work from.

It was super tough, I had a hard time matching the colours and mixing the right tones. I worked on it the whole afternoon but felt that I was too tired to make productive progress so I have left this painting unfinished for now. I might work back into it next week or just restart it.

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Thursday 11th April

This morning we did a colour theory exercise with Sylvia. I set up my still life with a red apple and a banana with my background being blue, yellow and orange. I used a few finder.

I did a light sketch before starting the painting. I blocked in the colours that were furthest away first then the objects. Sylvia said that next time I should paint in the shadows onto the white of the page as I go instead of blocking in the one colour completely as I did today.

I found it really tough but in a good way, it felt like I was learning. The yellow was especially tough, lilac was what I added to it to add in a shadow, it took a lot of workshopping as I had also added a bit of orange to reflect the other wall.

I think the exercise was really helpful and I feel I have a deeper understanding of colour.

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Fota Trip

Tuesday 9th April

The trip to fota was brilliant, I had brought my A5 sketchbook, a sharpie and my pencils.

These were my most succesful sketches from the day. When I took photos of them for tumblr, I did what I learned when making the book by upping the brightness to make them stand out.

I started off sketching with a 4b pencil but it had been sharpened with a craft knife so it came out in thin lines . I sketched a few different animals before switching to sharpie which suited me much better. The pencil woupd have been suited to longer poses but as the animals moved and the light changed, I kept the drawings quick.

As you can probably tell the kangaroos were my favourite animal to draw, they were free- roaming around the park and were snoozing in the sunlight so it was easy to stand and draw them. It was quite hard especially when it came to the ears as they looked a bit like bunny ears if I drew them too big.

The monkeys were really cool! We saw them swinging through the trees and their arms were super long. They moved fast and I only endee up with one that resembled a monkey. Even though it's not a very accurate monkey I think the awkwardly bent arm and the face convey what they looked like when we caught that glimpse of them.

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Monday 8th April

This morning we jumped straight back into life painting. I found today really difficult. The model was laying on a plinth made of donkeys and a blanket. It was a very challenging set up to paint. I started out on a small page amd Sylvia suggested going bigger. My problem was mainly the plinth's angles as I was at the top of the room by the models head it was a very weird view of the plinth.

I kept getting the plinth wrong but I realisee after that much of the struggle was me trying to paint around the model i had already painted. The figure I'd painted was slightly too long because I'd tried to fit the bigger page and I should have just re-painted the figure instead of adjusting the table. Lesson hopefully learned.