Acrylic paint. Abstracts. Right now it’s a love-hate relationship. Learning a new thing is hard. You have to put the sweat and tears in and hope for the best. Good thing though, with this course, we’re not expected to make pretty art. Not even passable as art at all, at least in the first six to eight weeks. We’re just supposed to play with the acrylic paint, brushes, mark making tools etc and figure out what we love and what we don’t.
You’d think that just learning to play with acrylic paint would be easy. Not so much. We’ve been trained for so long to only seek results. So when someone tells us to go out and find what we like and don’t like but don’t try to make anything acceptable, it’s contrary to all the teaching we’ve had all our lives. It’s actually HARD to just play for no reason. No goal. In fact Louise (our instructor) wants us to NOT make art at all, don’t try to make a pretty painting. Yowsa that’s HARD.
We’re in our fourth week of the course and I’m still struggling. I do think I’ve come to an epiphany though. I think I like more representational painting than fully abstract. Yes, I want to be able to do a painting that is abstract. I’m not sure though that it’s what I need to do NOW. With the course we can do it abstract or representational or a combo of both. I think I want to try doing a combo of both. When I just try abstract I’m not as centered.
Louise made a comment on one of her talks when she mentioned future work for artists trying to break out of boredom from previous work. She said that usually, new work will blossom from old. That there will be a thread from your previous work that moves you forward. Interestingly, when I watched her do a demo on a representational painting of oranges, it was the first time I truly lit up watching her paint. I wanted so much, in that moment, to try just what she was doing. So I think my first step is to paint in a semi-abstract way. I think I finally realize that if I want to learn to use acrylic paint successfully I have to start with semi-representational work.
The one painting that I felt the most free painting was the pears that I’ve showed you already. I know it needs more work and I intend to steal it back from my mother and work on it again, lol.
This week, as we begin to work on intention, (for instance, I want to express joy or love or an emotion in this painting, or I want to paint how I feel about the color red in this painting), I decided to go back and try to paint semi-representationally. I really liked when I added flowers to the play piece above so that’s what where I started out . My intention was to paint happiness. I also only used colors that make me truly happy. Previously, I tried to also add some moody colors in, to help move the paintings out of possibly being too garish. Well, that doesn’t work for me, I love bright colors so those are the ones I’m gonna use.
I’ve also decided that I’m not only going to revisit flowers but also fruit and veg. I had started exploring flowers in watercolor and pen and ink in the last few months or so and I think Louise is right, that holds the key to moving forward.
Hey, I am learning what I love. Who knew?
So, that’s how it’s going so far. Yep, probably a dozen unfinished pieces, but one or two that I see light in, that I feel just might hold a spark of the art I’d like to make in the near future. It’s a journey. It’s a struggle. But it’s so worth all the sweat and tears. How else can we become the artists we want to be? Artists who put our whole heart on the page for the world to see.
Thanks for listening. Talk soon.
PS. sorry I’ve been, once again, away for two weeks. I’ve been a little under the weather. I probably will have a couple teeth pulled in the next week. Eek! I hate the dentist. Wish me luck!
Supplies Used:
- Hahnemühle Cézanne and Leonardo 100% cotton mould made watercolor paper, 140 & 300lb respectively. (I gesso the paper to keep the colors from sinking into the paper and it allows me to sand back any paint I want to as I add layer after layer of acrylics.
- Golden heavy body acrylics
- Liquitex Basics acrylics
- Mod Podge 1″, 2″ & 4″ wide paddle brushes (these are so cool for making unique marks)
- artist tape
- stay wet palette (7″x8″, 12″x16″)
If you’d like to purchase Hahnemühle paper at your local stores, please see my “Where To Buy” list.
Nan
I work with watercolor and mosaic. I spent 6 months taking acrylic painting classes, but I must say, my favorite part of painting acrylics is underpainting / painting backgrounds. What is your favorite part?
Tracy
Jenn, I think what for you is “semi-abstract” is what I think of as “loose” painting. I don’t want to do hyper-realism (any more lol) and I don’t want to do really realistic. But I want someone to look at what I’ve done and KNOW….it’s a tree, river, pear, etc. But then to have that moment where they start to think “how the hell did I know that was a tree when there isn’t a single leaf or pine needle actually painted?”.
I’ve been playing more with value and doing value sketches simplified down to just 4 or 5 shapes as prep lately (I’m working with soft pastels more than watercolor at the moment). I’m finding that thinking about value and big shapes is really helpful for trying to break my habit of attempting to put in too many details.
I really do like even your “unpretty” paintings. That class sounds very liberating!
Sandra Strait
I find that abstract painting helps when I’m facing artist’s block. Not having a strict purpose and just playing with the paint gets my creative juices going again. I love what you’re doing with this class!
Jean Marmo
Good luck at the dentist. You are learning and that is what counts. These all look very interesting.
Susan C
Jenn I love your pears! I also really like the first abstract you show here. I like the movement and the colours, the energy. I think playing without purpose is a wonderful way to learn, to spark creativity, to welcome one’s own voice. I’ve been folllowing Louise for a while, even though abstract and acrylics are not my thing (at present, anyway) and I like her ideas about making art.
I can feel your excitement.
Hate going to the dentist, too, as I’ve not had proper enamel on my teeth my whole life. My first root canal was at age 14, without freezing, and I’ve had about 8 of them, three bridges, and a partial plate. Next month I go to get my remaining top teeth pulled and a full plate put in. Yep, getting me a new set of choppers. I’m not looking forward to the experience, but it’s necessary. Good luck with your dentist. Keep painting.
alice
you know I love everything you do. my favorites are those little houses – you have them in a couple pieces – I like those a lot!
Jennifer Rose
good luck at the dentist 🙂
and you look like you are having fun with the paints, and that is all that really matters 🙂
Linda Kunsman
Oh my gosh Jenn, I am loving that top set of paintings so much, and your pears are fantastic!!! It looks and sounds like you are taking away a lot form this course and that’s what really counts.
Lynette
Hi Jenn. Missing you. Hope you are creating more beautiful artwork. Sending hugs and love. – Lynette
Sharon Gullikson
I really like how you did the flowers!!!