Learning more by copying

This time I have been copying a painting by the daily painter Carol Marine. It is small, 15 x 21 cm. I have painted it in oil, like the original version. It was very interesting to do this excercise as it is another way of painting than I am used to. It is alla prima, painted in one go.

What I realize I really need to learn more about, is use of colours. And I think copying other artists as I am doing these days is really valuable to me,

Learning by copying

I have been working on another of my house paintings the last days, but it will not reveal itself no matter how much I try. So, at the end of the day yesterday, I decided to leave it for a while and instead practice painting tecniques by copying an other artist. So I made this painting, which is highly inspired by a painting by the artist Melinda Matayas. My painting turned out quite a bit darker than Mataya´s painting, but I decided to leave it like this as it kind of works.

I like Mataya´s way of using colours and how she decomposes the objects. So I will make yet another copy today.

Inspired by Francis Bacon

Oil and acrylic on canvas, 18x24 cm, not title.

Painted today, inspired by the surrealistic paintings by Francis Bacon. I had no plan, but had Francis Bacon paintings in my mind. I started out with a blue background. Then I used my personal creativity trick! - I take a bottle of acrylics which has a thin needle-like opening and then quickly draw random lines which I immediately drag out with a dishwasher sponge! Then I start looking for interesting shapes, figures etc. I repeat this process until I see a figure I can work and build on. This time it was enough with one quick swirl with the acrylics bottle, and I saw this figure appearing. To me it is person bathing in the night. I tried out some figures and some orange colour in the upper right corner to balance the blue and to have something the person could gaze on, but I found that it disturbed the painting.

House painting

Acrylics on canvas, 30x40 cm, no title.

I was not able to take a good photo (with my mobile camera..) that made it possible to crop it properly, so the wall behind is present in this photo.

I am currently working on some colour field paintings, i.e. abstract paintings where I am just focusing on the colour fields. It is part of a task we have got from the evening course I am attending at Den Tverrfaglige Kunstskolen DTK, an art school close to Oslo. Have look at their webpage: www.kunstskole.com    I have been attending this weekly evening course there the last months and I find it very inspiring. Today is my day off from the office - so, back to painting colour fields!

Sunbathers

Acrylic and oil on canvas, 18x24 cm.

A couple on a beach I guess, but the ambience between them is ambiguous.

I have made a similar painting previous, but I wanted to explore the two figures again to see what happened. It is always exciting to se how a painting unfolds as I don´t know myself before I start painting.

Harbour scene

Acrylics and oil on painting, 18x24 cm, no title.

I have been working on some larger paintings lately, but focusing again on these small format paintings is just so satisfying as you actually get to finish them in a day or two or so.

This one I started yesterday, I just started with some yellow and orange underpaint and had no concrete plan other than possibly a house-theme again. For a long time there were a mountain in the horizon on this painting, but it eventually had to go as it was disturbing to the composition.

Again I have to say I am surprisesd by the stringency that I am about to develop in my paintings.? It stands in contrast to my watercolour paintings I made just a year ago which were pretty loosely painted. But I choose to go with the flow and paint in the style that kind of feels right right now, allthough I cannot explain where this drive to paint minimalistic and abstract landscape paintings comes from.

As every painting is a surprise to myself, I am not only a painter but also a curious observer of the finnished pieces. And to me this painting is again a kind of a harbour-scene with the ocean lying still, and perhaps it is in the middle of the night and the moon is shining?

Colours and summer are coming

Acrylic and oil on canvas, 18x24 cm, no title.

Very surprising colours! As I did not have any plan when I started this small daily painting, I just went with the flow and kind of followed what I saw might be possible solutions as I painted. For example, the two green blocks there, that was just some lines from the underpaint, and I just thought they might do something for the composition. Then I got the association of trees, and now they might represent abstracted trees - or something else for another viewer. To me the painting turned out a summer landscape, a house beside a harbour and the bright sun shining. The colours and the shapes look almost like the small children´s building blocks.

To me, this exploring journey as I paint, not knowing myself which shapes and which colours will "appear" is what excites me! And sometimes it really surprises me - I don´t see my self as attracted to neither cubism nor naivism, but that is what appears on the canvas!?

House in the night

Oil on canvas, 18x24 cm, no title.

A daily painting painted in one day. Normally I just paint and see what happens, what appears on the canvas, with hardly any plan in advance. But this image appeared in my mind after I went to bed the other evening, so it was just to paint it out on the canvas.

Farm on a steep hill

Acrylics and oil on canvas, 18x24 cm.

A true daily painting, painted all together today.

Bathing beauty

Oil on canvas, 30x40 cm, not title.

The fun thing about not having a sketch or a pre-thought desing is that painting becomes an surprising adventure. The only thing I knew when I started with this painting was that it was going to be a portrait.  The expression, style, colours and the scene came as I painted. This painting started off with some really quick and lose brush strokes with acrylics, and from there I continued with oils. First, I attempted a loose style, which I kind of liked. But then I messed it up. Then I attempted a more "classic" painting style, but the result bored me, so I wiped it off. This morning I started out with a fresh mind, and I decided to paint it more like the manner I paint my house-paintings.

I wonder if the ligth blue line in the bottom right corner is too strong? Perhaps I will adjust it a little bit.

Different

Acrylic and oil on canvas, 18x34 cm, no title.

Different expression than usual. With just a lay-out with acrylics, this painting is painted today with oils. Was dissatisfied with the first try, so I wiped off the paint with a palet knife. Kind of liked the structure on the house that appeared. And I decided I wanted a lighter foreground, as opposed to the dark foreground I had on the first go.Not at all perfect, perhaps even bad, but here it is.

Acrylics and oil

Acrylic and oil on canvas, 18x24, no title.

Ah, it felt like a relief to finnish the painting with oil. It is a much more satisfying medium to work with. The advantage of painting wiht acrylics is that they dry really fast so I can continue building on the painting quickly. But finnishing with oil feels great.

Winter

Acrylics on canvas, 18x 24 cm, no title.

I have used many days on this painting, all though you cannot believe that when you see these simple shapes. But it has been through many stages of varying bright colours and different scenes, before I stripped it down boths in terms of shapes and colours.

Summer house?

Acylics on canvas, 18x24 cm.

A summer house? I feel I am in a small struggling period, the paintings are not daily paintings at the moment, more sort of a-couple-of-weeks paintings. I am not quite satisfied with this one either, but force myself to finnish it sort of, and post it. I think the darker blue should be somewhat different, but I cannot find the right blue. Perhaps it will come later. Besides, I am also struggling a bit with the acrylics, I just recently bought acrylics from the brand Amsterdam, but I am not quite sure if I like them. I would appreciate tips on brands that works well for other artists. What do professional artists use??

Abstract houses

Acrylics on canvas, 24x30 cm, no title.

Hm...I have been struggling a bit with this one. But here it is.

Houses, houses

Acrylics on canvas, 18x24 cm.

More stringent expression in this painting.
It is one of my days off job today, so that means painting day! I have my studio at the kitchen table at the moment. I do have a big studio, where I have bigger canvases. But at the moment neither being in the studio nor painting on bigger formats works very well for me. As Carol Marine says in her book "Daily painting" you learn far more by painting small formats paintings because you actually get to finnish you paintings, and then can learn from each piece you make.

We are all living on the one and same planet

Acrylic on canvas, 18x24 cm.

More houses

Acrylics on canvas, 18x24 cm.

Not quite sure about this painting. Perhaps I need to adjust the values of some of the shapes. After weeks with a good flow, the last weekend I was struggling. Painted the whole day both Saturday and Sunday, but couldn´t get it right with none of the paintings I am working on. Not totally satisfied with this on either, but post it anyway.

The fantastic thing though, is that I have now started working only 70% in my job as a social scientist, so now I get 30% time off to concentrate on painting! I feel so lucky to have got this possibility!

Tall house

Another house. Acrylics on canvas, 18x24 cm. As allways, no plan, no sketch, just following the "flow" and looking for possibilities as the painting evolves.This painting actually started out as a orange horisontal house, but it did not work out. Then I saw a possible tall house there instead.

I haven´t stepped up and started to buy artis quality canvases yet. Here you can see a good reason for not bying cheap canvases, though: You can see a shadow on both upper corners - these are a result of the canvas not being stretched enough. So, note to self I guess - start buying better quality canvases!

Daily painting

Acrylic on canvas, 18x24 cm, no title.

The huge advantage of painting on such small canvases is that you get to finnish a painting in a day or two. And this production of paintings lead to what is most important for an amateur artist like me, namely the possibility to learn from each painting I make and hopefully progress as I go forward.