I’ve often heard this advice, as the basis of a philosophy of life. Not everybody would endorse it. Once I said this to a friend whose response was, “I did, and look where it got me!” Given her personal history I can see why she took that view. Although it may not be very sound as a guide to life in general, I do think that it has something to recommend it in the context of art. So I’ve been taking it seriously today.
Some time back I decided to begin work on a study of a huge tangle of tree roots, partially showing through a bank of fallen leaves. The intense colours suggested to me that it might be an idea to experiment with a technique I’ve heard mentioned on several occasions. Often artists are inhibited by the severe, uniform white of the paper or canvas, so they begin work by covering it completely with some colour. This then gives a unifying background tone to the finished work, because it shines through the paint in several places. I suppose that this serves, for media such as oil or acrylic, the same function as the choice of a toned paper does for pastel artists. Although the idea is familiar to me when I work in pastels I had never tried it with paint. So: I took a canvas and covered it uniformly with a bright red acrylic wash.
The effect was quite startling, but not deterred, I then began to paint the composition loosely over the top. I was fairly pleased with some aspects of the results, but before long I became stuck. The right thing to do seemed to be to hang it in the studio wall and see how I felt about it as time went by. I’ve forgotten exactly when I did that, but it was on the wall for several months, teasing me with the suggestion that something could be made of it, but withholding any clue as to exactly what that might be. I didn’t want to scrap it: but couldn’t see what to do with it.
Then a couple of weeks ago I decided that I would develop another, earlier image I had done in acrylic, which felt rather dull and lacked a sense of depth. It had been hanging around literally for years and I had never had the confidence to exhibit it. Suddenly, sorting through material on my racks, I had the inspiration to work over the acrylic surface with pastel, developing the highlights and intensifying some of the shadows, in order to create that missing sense of depth. I also introduced highlights in the clouds to give a feeling of a more intense light. It worked very well, and I have now had it framed, and will take it to Awesome Walls in Sheffield when I am next over there.*
Following that success, I decided do something similar with my tree-root picture. This is on canvas, not on board, and it struck me that it might yield to being worked over with oil pastels instead of the conventional dry pastels. So, today I got stuck in, and after a couple of hours I do feel that I am making some progress. There is a long way to go yet, in that there is still too much of the underlying red showing through, and in particular I need to develop the shadowed areas. I’m trying to work in a rather freer style than usual, which introduces another element of experimentation. Over the next week, however, I ought to be able to set aside some time to work on it, and I am looking forward to seeing how it shapes up. I am not certain whether I am prepared to try anything once, but it does appear to be sound advice in art to permit (or even compel) yourself to experiment every now and then.
My wife has a useful saying for these occasions. “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” Good point!
*The climbing wall has an upstairs lounge in which the management have kindly permitted me to display climbing-related pictures.