Monday 4 February 2008

sketches for something new...



Inspired by Lornas pocket sketchbook I have purchased one myself…I had a sketch book that I kept in my bag, but me being me, I never had my bag on me when struck with inspiration (i.e. in the pub…)…men and bags have never gone well together…so, now I have one of these funky little ‘Moleskine’ pads (couldn’t find a cheaper one that worked as well, so I forked out half my weeks beer money for this…and very nice it is too).

Anyway I’ve started scribbling down some ideas today for a new…’big’ painting….one of the complex, allegorical ones…this is an idea I’ve had floating around for a few months now….Perhaps the beginning of a darker, more personal series? I think it’s what I’m going to move onto next…I COULD try and do it in time for the RA Summer exhibition…IF I do it in acrylic and work…REALLY hard on it…am in two minds about that…one, I’m lazy… and two, guess I’m a bit snobby about the kudos of oil on ‘ big significant art!’…sometimes, my head is SO far up my own arse…I certainly won’t get it done for the RA if I try it in Oil, I MIGHT get it done if I work in Acrylic (Well, technically it might be possible)…I guess I’m a bit torn because I think it could be a really good painting and I want to do it as well as I can…and I think my oil work is better than my acrylic…

So, these are my scribbles done throughout the day…I’m not sure how clear they are to anyone other than me and you’ll have to excuse my spelling…(I suspect I’m actually dyslexic rather than simply stupid, but we never looked for such things when I was at school…). But this is the way I work on these things, several ideas, some thumbnail sketches, some notes in text. From that I’ll pull together some source material, sketches, photographs etc and then I’ll start building up a ‘cartoon’…I’m always amazed those old master sketches are called cartoons…it never seems right…

Well that’s where this idea is currently at, 4 months of drunken thinking, a few sketches done…now it needs some work on the source material and then a proper drawing…then it’ll be ready for painting…so, a push for a finished acrylic…or a measured oil…what do you think??? Come on you lurkers, post an opinion…:)

7 comments:

Lorna said...

... erm ... I have 3 drawing books like the three bears ... small, medium and large.

Try some small studies before you settle and start a cartoon. I shall enjoy seeing the process of this painting.

Unknown said...

Ah, but this new sketchbook actually fits in my pocket, so in theory, it will always be with me :) There will be…and indeed have already been several small scribbles to try out various compositions and formats…Currently I think it’ll be something like the small square in the top left of the first page…I can see what I’ve scribbled into it, but I’m not that sure it’s clear to anyone else :)

Lorna said...

That is why I have the small one also but have also found that with them I am able to resist making "finished" drawings.

Looked at the sketch you indicated but will have to wait until things become clearer.

MissT said...

I've always loved looking at artists sketch books. it's so frustrating at exhibitions when they are under glass and stuck on one page.

The Tate have digitised Turner's sketch books. I treat myself to a peek every so often:

http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/SketchbookViewer?cgroupid=65681&page=1

When I was in Amsterdam, I saw that Rembrant used to make sketch book type engravings too.

Thanks for sharing your scribbles :-)

SueC said...

Very interesting. I can't make out what the theme/feeling is behind it all just yet...but thats part of the fun at looking at preliminary sketches....but whatever it is..its certainly passionate or empassioned???

SueC said...

P.S. You asked for an opinion on oil or acrylic. If this is as an important piece to you as I suspect it is...then do it in the medium you feel most empowered in...which...I suspect, is oil....slowcoach ;-)

Unknown said...

I know what you mean Lucy, you need to see a WHOLE sketchbook to understand the thoughts of the artist, the way ideas can bounce around all over the place…a couple of pages under glass, isn’t enough.

The theme/feeling behind it is HUGELY negative Sue, but I think It’s probably something I should try and work out of my system via canvas…I have a few in a similar vein I might try and get out of my system this year…hopefully they’ll be nice big gutsy works that take forever to paint and are totally unsellable… but sometimes, ya gotta do, what ya gotta do ;)

I think I’m leaning towards doing this in oil…which means one other thing I gotta do, is come up with something for the Summer Exhibition…