Burning' and Lootin'

First work: done.

Not that there isn't more to do on this one -- the tones on those signs should be a little more consistent. That baseball player needs way more black on his upper body and shoes. I could probably work a bit more on the panel transitions. I definitely need to figure out how to hang these panels (D-rings?)



Sadly, it's a numbers game now. I've got two weeks left to finish my other much more neglected major work. If there's time, I'll address these issues as best I can. Compromise is such an ugly thing.

It's probably still too fresh to decide whether I like this piece or not. I can say that I don't love it. But maybe that's because I can't help but think about the concessions I had to make to my original idea of having these portraits be life-sized on door-sized panels of wood. I wish there was a way to make this happen, but I'm not even one of those people that can re-visit a work to touch it up, let alone recycle the same idea.

Triplets

The photo quality isn't great, but here's a quick look at the three panels that I've done so far.


Batman's been a problem child since day one, and to be honest, there's still something about him that gets under my skin. Unfortunately, I have neither the time/effort to re-attempt that particular panel, and I can't think of anything that I could do different to make it better. Hmmm. I guess I'm getting a bit over this project, as evidenced by the steady decline in quality/enthusiasm since the astronaut.


Anyways, three down with the remaining two primed and ready. Next Friday is my D-Day.

Haterade

Two down, with a third about 3/4 done and the last two prepped and on deck.


Some lingering issues:

1) That text really irks me. I'll wait till all five panels are painted and then re-do it all.

2) I didn't notice at first, but my studio neighbour astutely pointed out the abrupt transition between the panels. Again, I'm going to wait till I've got everything done before adding some cross-panel drips to smooth it out a bit more and add a bit of visual continuity. (Thanks, Nick)


On a side note, whilst prepping my remaining panels with a yellow undercoat the baseball player I'd painted earlier turned out as pictured. Dig that soft look. People have been telling me to include it in the sequence but I think homogeneity's an important part of this project. Maybe if I had a mulligan I'd steer the whole thing in that direction, but it's surely way too late now.

Narcotraficantes

I haven't actually liked anything else that Joe Carnahan's done but I quite love "Narc". It's gritty, intense, and raw, and that's exactly how I want to paint.



I had a clear vision for the backgrounds of my five panel piece (see previous post) as a flat and ambiguous space, but the inability of my brain to think in abstract terms has produced a bit of a muddled mess.

In my previous painting experiences, I have absolutely loathed what I have been making until, at some unexpected and unpredictable interval, the lightbulb clicks and everything ends well. So it's really just a matter of pushing through the self-hatred until this epiphany unfolds. That's what I like about painting -- you can keep on slapping down colours till the thing goes from ugly, ugly, ugly, ugly to magic.

Behind Every Disney Character Is A Chain Smoking Animator

First of all, apologies for the increasingly delayed posts. Since I typically dive right into my paintings without doing any real prep work (apart from gleaning some photographic source material) and because of how long it takes me to actually paint, I find myself in these long stretches of time where I don't feel like there's anything worth showing.

Final concept board

With that said, I have currently embarked on a new project that, for the first time in a long while, has pushed me outside of my conceptual comfort zone. It's a sad fact but since I've studied at art school I've become utterly dependent on drawing from reference. The emphasis on anatomical precision and formal qualities has killed the fearlessness with which I used to just draw. With this project, however, I've returned to the basics, and as difficult and frustrating as it's been at times, it's been just as fun rediscovering my sea legs.

Unused sketches

Basically, I'm doing a five-panel series of full bodied portraits on 90 x 60 x 1.2 cm particleboard panels featuring character archetypes of the things I dreamed about becoming when I was a kid. Each will hold a sign that, when read in sequence, will spell out the phrase, "Not all dreams come true." I guess it's pretty melancholy but I wanted to make a piece about the sadness that exists in happy memories.

On a side note, I actually wanted to be a mailman because they got to ride a motorbike, but it wasn't as universal (or cool) as the other archetypes in the lineup -- hence, Evel Knievel. I thought about replacing him with a cop but that felt a little too real world for the vibe I was going for.


As a consolation prize for my tardiness, here's a page of sketches for the other project that I've got going this semester: a collection of six square canvases depicting G.I. Joe action figures that I used to own, posed and damaged in rough emulation of war-wounded veterans.