Over the past few months the wave for creating stop-motion videos has once again grabbed me, and clay is typically an essential material in their creation. By exploring different concepts and experimenting with various ways of presenting them through visuals in the videos, it's shifted me to a different way of painting. I'm exploring new terrain in my paintings by creating a form of terrain on the flat surface.
A Visit, 35" x 24", 2016
By forming a three-dimensional surface, with both subtle and distinct shapes and texture, the piece blurs the lines between sculpture and painting. I like the effect of the properties of clay, such as its natural color, its cracked surface, and the way the paint adheres to it. As the clay dries, it cracks naturally, creating an effect that resembles decay, a reminder of our own vulnerability in this world.
What's a bit disappointing though, is that in this day of social media and the ubiquity of the internet in everything we do, art benefits when the image of it transfers nicely to our computers, tablets, or phones. Here I go again . . . Maybe most painters/sculptors are somewhat disappointed with how their works transfer to a computer? But in this case, I think much is lost (more than usual) of the painting when seen only through the "lens" of your screen; when seen in person, the three-dimensional nature of the painting changes its look based on the lighting or the angle of the viewer as a result of varying highlights, shadows, and the nature of some of the pearlescent paints used here.
Detail A Visit
This painting references Pablo Picasso's famous blue period, particularly, one of my favorite pieces at LACMA: Portrait of Sebastia Juñer Vidal (1903).
Detail: A Visit