This is the last violin painting in a series of five! I rarely have the attention span for five paintings of the same subject! I am ready to move on to other subject matter. Landscapes, perhaps? I have a ton of pictures of Europe from my sister who is currently living in Spain. You might be seeing a totally different style to my work in the months to come. I’m always experimenting and always learning something new. I have to keep the my work interesting.
This is a small 10″w x 8″h painting that is meant to compliment the other violin paintings in this series entitled “Fit as a Violin”.
"Fit as a Violin #3" - Acrylic on canvas 11"w x 14"h
Yes, it’s another violin. In this painting I tried something slightly different. I wanted to explore a unique angle. A violinist would see it from this angle when it’s cradled under their chin. Ahh… just you wait. There are two more violin paintings to come!
"Koi Fish in a Shallow Pond" - Acrylic painting on canvas (18"w x 14"h) - $275
If you have been following my work for a while you may have noticed that the style of painting varies widely. This painting represents a departure from my most recent work which incorporates an exploration of distressed textures. In this case, I’ve chosen to aim for realism.
Painting the reflections in this picture was the most difficult part. My goal in painting this image was to depict a fluidity to the surface of the water. As I painted, I noticed that when a reflection was over a dark area it was a dark navy color, but when it’s over a rock it takes on the color of the sky which is a gray-blue.
A vibrancy is created when you liberally choose a palette of contrasting colors. In this painting I’ve chosen to juxtapose a bright cadmium orange with green. To further promote the realism I follow a simple rule – Warm highlights, Cold shadows. For example, the highlights in the fish are a lemon yellow, whereas the shadows are a very cool cyan; giving the fish an iridescent quality.
Design also plays an important part in this painting’s composition. The fish are positioned so that your eye travels in a “Z” shape. While the big orange koi fish (just right of center) is the first thing that draws the viewer’s eye into the painting, the “Z” shaped composition stimulates the viewer to look at the whole painting.
This painting was even more fun to paint than the first. I love the dramatic lighting and the contrast of magenta and cadmium yellow.
"Fit as a Violin #2" - Acrylic on canvas 16"w x 20"h - $245
To achieve the interesting distressed background I started by covering the canvas with a thick layer of acrylic paint. Once the paint was tacky I layered crumpled tissue paper. Once the background was covered with tissue paper I began to drip and splatter a paint that was diluted with water. I kept applying paint until I was satisfied. In some areas I used a razor to distress the painted tissue paper, thus exposing the based layer of paint.
When I started this series of musical instruments I wasn’t entirely sure where I was going to find my subjects. In a desperate plea, I propositioned my Facebook friends, “Does anyone have a stringed musical instrument that I could paint?” Eric Glad, a friend I hadn’t seen in a long time, was the first to reply. He has been a hoarding a treasure trove of instruments which have been tenderly used in his most recent musical collaboration, a band called Glaun. He was kind enough to take a break from his college finals and allow me to photograph his accordion and violin. While an accordion isn’t exactly a stringed instrument, it was slightly more attractive than Mike Silva’s penny whistle. I promised to handle them while wearing a hermetically sealed plastic suit inside a sanitary hyperbolic chamber, with germ-killing UV light. If you knew Eric, you’d understand why he would insist on such a procedure. In exchange for making his musical instruments famous he gave me a copy of the Glaun Christmas album. It’s great, especially if you like emo rock with an accordion. I especially enjoyed the littered references to Popeye sung incoherently through each song.
"Fit as a Violin #1" - Acrylic on Canvas (18"w x 24"h) - $295
This piece is a departure from my most recent paintings. I started with a colorful image. In this case, I used a section of Henry Matisse’s “A Woman with a Hat.” I pixelated it. An then tried to reproduce the pixelated image on a 12″w x 12″h canvas. It was a fun challange to try paint each square with the right value and color. The result is a striking image of a woman’s face when viewed from a distance. When viewed up close, all you see is a fun pattern of colors.
This is the third painting in a series of my Fender Acoustic guitar.
Rock of Ages #3 - Acrylic on canvas 9"w x 11"h - $145
This is what the “Rock of Ages” series might look like in your living room, den, coffee shop, breakfast nook, space shuttle cockpit, or whatever!
"Rock of Ages" painting series featuring a Fender Acoustic guitar
Rock of Ages #2 - Acrylic on canvas 11"w x 9"h - $145
This is the second painting in a series that features musical instruments. This is a Fender acoustic guitar that I bought for myself about eight or nine years ago. As I mentioned in a previous post, this guitar just takes up space in my condo, and never get’s played. Ah, but it makes beautiful art.
Most of the time I purchase pre-made canvas on stretcher board for my paintings. As much as possible I work with sizes that fit easily in pre-made frames. Occasionally I find myself needing a custom sized canvas. Building your own canvas takes some extra work, but it’s an affordable solution especially if you need a very large canvas. All you need to build your own canvas are some supplies easily found at your local hardware store. Here’s an article that provides specific steps for building your own canvas.
