I continue to begin most days with drawings of the city from my studio windows using sumi ink and bamboo pen. The process led to an acrylic on paper painting in a larger than usual size. Using black and white has been extremely helpful to organize space more coherently. This week the color yellow made its appearance.
City, acrylic on paper, 26 x 40 inches ( 66 x 102 cm), 10/13/11
The evening figure class instructor changes the context of the set-up each week. This time the wall was covered with colorful posters. Two brilliant silk kimonos were hung on easels along with a vase of artificial flowers. The model sat among it all. It was important to use color, so I ran to my studio down the hall to collect my gouache materials.
Figure & kimono, gouache on paper, 15 x 11 inches ( 38 x 28 cm), 10/12/11
The process of visual critique that we engage in for homework continues to be a fascinating divergence from the sometimes tortured efforts of verbal response in what is familiarly know as “crits.” Edvard Munch’s painting The Scream, an image that launched countless illustration knock-offs, rivaled only by Grant Wood’s American Gothic in frequency, inspired my response to the open fig. I had anticipated doing a natural version of the hamburger; the cows arrived of their own accord. Two days later I developed the idea in oil paint.
Fig Scream, sumi ink & bamboo pen, 10 x 10 inches (25 x 25 cm), 10/10/11
Hamburger and Cows, sumi ink & bamboo pen, 10 x 10 inches (25 x 25 cm), 10/10/11
Cows and hamburger, oil on wood panel, 10 x 10 inches (25 x 25 cm), 10/12/11
Olives and plum, oil on linen panel, 8 x 10 inches (10 x 25 cm) 2011
Torn paper, charcoal, approx 18 x 24 in (46 x 61 cm), 10/06/11
Female nude, approx 15 x 11 inches ( 38 x 28 cm), 10/05/11
