Time to take stock....

After 53 paintings done in the course of 15 months, I feel the need to take stock and extract some key learnings from my painting experience with acrylics.

I derived a certain level of satisfaction creating my first painting series on Kauai. However, these works only looked half decent under optimal lighting conditions and seemed to literally die in the absence of direct light. This was a real let down coming from a watercolor background. The Chinese style underpainting (I was taking course in Chinese black ink painting at the time) with ultramarine blue most certainly did not help...

The "women's eyes" series that followed allowed me to fully explore the capabilities of both fluid and conventional acrylics with a relatively limited palette. I worked with and without white going from transparent to opaque application of paint. Towards the end of the series, I realized the benefits of working with both methods on the same picture, letting the underpainting show through for greater luminosity. I experimented with modeling paste for the first time to create textured backgrounds. I learned about the benefit of zinc white, which is transparent and takes longer to dry. I now mix it with titanium white whenever I need to emphasize these characteristics. I ended up emphasizing brush strokes using heavier paint and taking the risk of mixing directly on the canvas for more variety in colors.

With the beach painting series focusing on the female figure, I explored the graying of colors using titanium white and ivory black in small quantities. My intent was to apply a screen to my colors for more of a contemporary look. My main color palette was and still is limited to 3 key colors (others are added on an as need basis) not including black and white. I experienced with a more expressionist style but seemed to have fallen back to pure realism with minimal details and high contrast even going from pure white to pure black in the gradation of values. Throughout this series, I experimented with gel medium and varnishes for the accentuation of textures. So far, I have avoided "alla prima" painting, favouring a multilayered approach for more control and reserving thicker paint for the last layer.

The last painting from the series (a mother playing life guard, upper left) suggests that when I am left to my own devices, my tendency is to increase my level of comfort and play it safe. I have to remind myself that people rave about some of my "spontaneous" underpaintings and a professional artist already told me that my expressionist painting of a woman walking on the shore (middle right) was "more me" in relation to other paintings of mine. This feedback calls for a more expressive approach on my part... especially in the completion phase where I tend to reverse the machines, losing the freshness from the initial phases.

I have been lucky to hold 2 solo exhibitions this year and sell 10 paintings. The women's eyes series raised a few eyebrows (no puns intended) and people were quite receptive to my artistic statement.

I need to pause briefly before my next move... may the gods be with me when I get going again soon!