Switching up

Working out a new piece after spending time yesterday at the museum. This is influenced by Rampant Mythical Lion (Vyala), a 8th/9th century sandstone piece from India, Madjya Pradesh or Rajasthan. The piece reminded me how artifact images cross cultures and societies as a similar lion form appeared in an Iranian architectural detail from which I previously drew inspiration and in the Book of Kells from which I have also drawn inspiration in the past.

I don't often start with studies anymore, preferring to work directly with the flow of my materials instead, but I decided to do so on this piece to change up my habits and challenge my entry points into developing work. The first study is more literal than the ultimate piece will be. The second is an initial reduction study. After a few more reduction studies, I'll move to a flow study and then to the piece.

Reduce. Overlay, Recombine

Playing with reducing images to color overlays (upper) and recombining (lower) with the original image (middle)

Pic-A-Day: Lemur to Zebra

Two Layers: Lemur and Zebra

Looking Back

Periodically, I look back through old images to observe the evolution -- and the elements that are consistent -- in my work. It's one of the best ways of figuring out what's essential. Plus, usually a mix of "of course" moments and "egad, what was I doing" moments. No surprise that most artists cull old work that has not made it out the door. Digital documentation makes it easier to keep a record.

Endpoint Variance

It's Friday,the first one of the New Year, the start of the year and the end of the week (work week).

Which has me thinking about horizons, beginnings and end points.

The lines of symbols below in the making extended as close to an equidistant end point as each line would go, as one line of symbol text across the blogger entry panel. While reaching close to the same end point in the making, in preview end point variance was wider and in publication, the lines run over to the next row. The output lacks the design character of the input, which appear as a single wide bar.

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River, Sun, Thought

Started with an I Phone photo of sun hitting the surface of the Chicago River on a cold winter day and twinkling. Thought about the sun and winter and flashbacks from snow and ended up here.

Experimenting in a Mess

I'm staring at a mess I have yet to start cleaning up. Sigh. The jumble in the room matches the jumble in my head at the moment; perhaps that's why I am resistant to clearing out the room. Something's gelling.

Formal Play

Metaphor: Possibility, Restraint, Breach, Recovery

A flat circle capable of being a sphere loses that capability to a line until filling in the color mass below and above expands the two hemispheres, still constrained/restrained at the center; once close to fully filled in with color, the shape once a circle hovers near the possibility of again being able to be a sphere.

Color study

Thinking about what is "defining" and what is "relevant"

Essential: Gravity. Space. Differentiation among elements. Prior identity. Points of departure. Discovery. Present/Monumental. Lyricism. Light/Shadow. Integration. [Try to reduce this to three].

Relevant: Separating line and area/volume. Transparency. Color accumulation. The wall. Four walls. Level of transformation. Scale. Presence different than inspection. Stopping point/vacillation.

Irrelevant: Clarity, representation,

Undecided: Material, randomness, accident, figurative, narrative

Opposing: Mass amalgamation, linear, message delivery.

Doubts and more Doubt

I like my current project. But ... I might be the only one who does.

I wonder if other artists feel this way. When I make a drawing on paper, it's a drawing, something tangible, material, transferable. People understand it (even if, perhaps, one does not subjectively care for the image presented). Drawing directly on the wall is recognizable, though ephemeral and not transferable (though it can be mimicked at alternate sites, hence conceptually transferred). By holding to its prior identities, the work I currently am doing feels less easily recognizable as drawing, though, being comprised of objects, it is transferable.

Hard/Soft

Marks on Walls and Ins Space (V)

Blended Abstraction and Figuration

Marks on Walls and in Space (IV)

Marks on Walls and in Space (III)

Marks on Walls and in Space (II)

X

Marks on Walls and in Space

The coming end of the year oddly has me evaluating where my work is heading at the onset in intention, including peripheral intentions. Today, I have ended up thinking about the way my marks seem to need to be connected to shape and form, even a single mark is part of a larger shape or form when I consider making the mark, when I place the mark, when I step back from mark. When can one properly placed mark be enough to hold a wall or space?

PicADay: Digital Play Fold Flat

PicADay: Digital Play From Inside Outside

There is lots of room for quick and sequential play with digital tools. I am playing with the space between abstraction and representation -- pushing representation into abstraction and pushing the abstraction back to representation.