The Challenge for May: Abstract

Our challenge for this month is to do an abstract work of art.

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Donna Vines

I have always enjoyed looking at Abstract art but painting it is not easy.  It has to evoke an emotion, a feeling, something beyond a recognizable thing.  The more I thought about how to approach this the more I realized it is all in the colors to me.  I looked at several artists then looked through my photos to find a mood.  I finally chose a fall mountain scene because it looked so vibrant, alive and hopeful.

Vermont in the Fall
9x12 oil

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Jean Thomas

This is an abstract landscape that I made up from a sketch. My purpose here was to experiment with watercolor and try to get a wide range of value. The original is about 7" x 9".

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Abstract was a totally new idea in the art world when painters attempted to render a piece with no recognizable subject matter. The goal was to provoke a certain feeling and most art enthusiasts just didn't get it. "Radical, my kid could do it, just paint thrown on" were some of the oft heard reactions.  While times have changed I'm one who will tell you that good abstract art is much harder than painting something we can all identify.  Try painting an emotion (and no fair using flowers or a sunshine.)  I can't really get there but it is fun trying.  My piece definitely has discernible objects in it altho my husband and I see totally different things.  Maybe I got closer than I thought!

14 x 11, acrylic
Cindy Michaud
art@cindymichaud.com

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"Love in the Time of Coronavirus"
6x8, acrylic

I am not an abstract artist, so I employed a little Jackson Pollock to this and dropped the paint on the board from about four feet. Then I enhanced the round blobs to resemble COVID-19. It was fun.

Carmen Beecher

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Mary Warnick's Abstract

"Ocean Motion"

I have admired the work of John Salmonen for many years, especially his beautiful cityscapes.  Several years ago he gave a workshop in Melbourne and I signed up.  It turned out to be an abstract workshop.  It was very intensive and complicated.  I think he was trying to incorporate a few techniques into the process, including line drawing and the grid method of transferring an image.  Over time I tried simplifying, but stuck to his advise "if it starts looking like something, get rid of it before you fall in love with it".   This little watercolor is a very simplified version.

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Kathy's response to the challenge:

I love to doodle and when I have nothing in mind to draw, that's what I do. One of my favorite methods is to randomly draw two lines across a page or canvas and then fill them in . Below is my progress from start to finish on canvas. Then I took it into Photoshop to finalize it. Click on any image to expand it.

Moment of Impact
8x10 Acrylic to Photoshop
Kathy Garvey

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Hope is a Thing ...
Mixed Media Collage
by Fay Picardi

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One Percent
Denette Schweikert

This "painting" is the left side of the I am very beginning of a large 36" X 46" picture.  I am not very good at abstracts.  

As the year winds down and I prepare for my sorta-annual bonfire of canvases that don’t make the cut of hanging around, I always feel a need to dream up some new challenges for a new year.  I can’t really articulate those yet but as I was studio cleaning I found a stack of unused canvases and some leftover interior wall paints that were way past their “use by” dates (kidding of course).  So I pulled them all out and tried to leave my comfort zone.

If you know my “work” then you know how far afield this is for me.  Colors, drips, splats and splotches.  Actually both pieces began with a “thing” in mind (that’s just me) but the more I got into it the more I began to have definitive ideas about where the next chunk of color should go, and whether it must be light or dark. I lost all concept of the “thing.”  And I began experimenting with tools: credit cards, sponges, chop sticks and gravity.  I even got out my spray bottle of water.

A friend stopped in and spent some time studying this one at an earlier stage.  She was trying hard not to insult me and yet still ask me where it was going.  “I’m not sure,” I answered honestly.  “Does it go vertical?” she ventured.  Same answer.  “But?” I explained that right now I was playing with color and shape and motion...not very well I might add.  In all likelihood I would end up sketching a large figure on it and then painting out the background.

She looked distressed and said “Do you mean you would then cover up all your hard work?”

 

I paused.  Not once had what I was doing felt like work.  Never mind, “hard work.” More like  child’s play, experimental efforts and exploration. But not work.  Which is not to say that some days painting something (like a nose or a hand or a flower) is and feels like very hard work.  But not this.

Why are we afraid to experiment? Why must everything we do have an expected, acceptable outcome? Folks are horrified that I burn old paintings.  Is everything you do perfect? How boring!  How will you know if you like a new spice if you don’t cook with it? Fabulous or failure, to me it is worth the effort.

So I’m not sure where these will end up.  They could be my artistic break through and earn me thousands of dollars. Or they could be numbers 1 and 2 in next years burn.  Right now it does not matter.  Perfection is the enemy of a lot of things.

Let’s all vow for a bit more play and a little less work in 2020.

Cindy Michaud

www.cindymichaud.com

Questions: Art@cindymichaud.com

Where Am I Going?, Small Oil Paintings, Daily Paintings

Traditionally, this time of the year,  is when we evaluate our performance, over the last twelve months, and look at the direction we are headed.

Artistically, I see nothing but question marks.  I want to have a clear plan, a path to follow and mark my progress, but alas, it evades me.

I looked through my posts from last year, and picked out my favorite pieces, hoping against hope that they will tell me where I am headed.

 Abstract Expressionism?

Maybe....

Thick Paint?

 Impressionism?

 Brushwork?

 Knife?

Really thin paint?

Or does it really matter?

All this thinking is making my head hurt!  

I am happy I found this many pieces, from last year, that speak to ME.  I am happy with them which makes me happy with me.

Maybe 2020 will find me treading the straight and narrow.....but somehow, I don't think so.

Thank you all, for joining me on my crazy, unplanned journey!

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Hubby keeps me grounded!

Carol Schiff

www.CarolSchiffStudio.blogspot.com

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November Challenge, Do an Avant-Garde Work of Art

This month we were challenged to create a work of art inspired by an artist or movement considered avante-garde. The term "avant-garde" covers a plethora of styles and simply means art that is very modern or original in comparison to the styles of the period in which it is made. (Artists who pop to mind are Picasso, Kandinsky, Mondrian, etc.) For some of us it means stepping way out of our comfort zone, which is the whole point of our challenges.

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Donna's response to the challenge

Well this challenge lived up to it's purpose.  I was out of my comfort zone in a few ways. For some reason I thought it would be better to use acrylics, not so and I had no idea Cubism would be so restrictive to me!!  You have to color inside the lines, which is not good for me.
Cubism is breaking down a subject to a basic geometric form and painting it in a flat manner.  I picked two very round subjects thinking that would make an interesting contrast. 
This is what a dish of pears and a teapot looked to me in a Cubist style.

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Carmen's response to the challenge

"The Death of Truth"

I used Picasso as my inspiration, and the sun/lamp is almost a direct steal from his painting, "Guernica." I think the painting is self-explanatory.

Carmen Beecher

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Kathy's response to the challenge

I love Klee, Kandinsky, and Picasso so I had a hard time choosing who to use as my inspiration, but settled on Kandinsky because his art is just fun to me and I thought I could even try it in watercolors. He really worked to make his images with non-representative symbols, just lines, squiggles, dots and geometric shapes so that it inspired a "feeling" rather than a "meaning" for observers.

Above was my "dry run" just using a mix of his favorite symbols and his way of color blocking them and filling in the background. When I discovered, that despite his attempts to avoid representation, he had put a tiny bird in one of his paintings I really felt he was a kindred spirit. So I included one, too. (Click on the image to zoom in and find it.)



Then I did a larger piece mimicking elements in some of his more geometric paintings.

While this is representative of his painting style, it has meaning (at least to me) as each Kandinsky inspired circle contains the first initial of one of my ten grandchildren.

Kathy Garvey

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Mary's response to the challenge

Channeling Chagall

While still in college I saw Chagall’s “I and My Village” and was enchanted by the color, the design and the sense of joy he captured on a huge canvas. I’ve always loved his work, but found it hard to copy when the Pieces of 8 project of copying the masters took place almost a decade ago. Trying to capture some of his joy and playfulness in a composition of my own was more fun.

Mimicking Miro 
Then, for fun, I tried a design in bright colors, encouraged by Kathy, who is a master of design.  Fay thought it reminded her of Joan Miro’s work.

Mary Warnick





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Jean Thomas Looks at Winslow Homer

“Fox Hunt” by Winslow Homer was a painting I chose to explore. I'm not sure it is avant gard, but it was inspired by a book on Homer I picked up at an estate sale. It’s a large (38” x 68”) oil. Painted in 1893, late in his career, after he moved to Prout’s Neck, ME. It was reproduced in black and white and was only 3” wide. Still it intrigued me.

Homer’s watercolors were more numerous than his oils and he often used the watercolors as preliminary studies. Also, he chose watercolor when he traveled to the Caribbean. This painting was of the coast of Maine, a frequent subject for him at that time.

Once I researched the painting in hopes of getting a better reproduction of it, the story got interesting.  I discovered what seemed to be black blobs in the upper right corner, were crows. And what is going on is that the crows (usually the prey) are out to get the fox! It’s cold, it’s bleak and the fox is running for his life. He is stretched across the canvas, slowed by snow and hunger.  Ahead of him is only water. No escape from fate.

I wondered if Homer ever did do a watercolor of this subject, and if he had, how would it have looked?  I wish I could see the original to see the details and the colors he chose. It is hanging at the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. So here’s my version of “Fox Hunt” in watercolor.

Thank you Mr. Homer.

Abstract Painting, Small Oil Painting, Daily Painting, Triptych Painting

Every now and then, I just have to do an abstract.  Usually painting knives are involved.  This one is no exception.   I wanted to take a square composition and turn it into a rectangle. This us what I came up with.

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and here is the original square composition.  Which do you prefer?

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I have been in North Carolina, in the mountains for the past few weeks.  We are enjoying our time here.

The other day we went to the park and had a picnic lunch, something we never do at home.  There were ducks and geese everywhere.

We had a relaxing and fun time and our sandwiches tasted twice as good as usual.  The crisp fall weather comes and goes.  It is so much fun to be in the mountains this time of the year and I cannot wait for the fall color.   I will share with you when it comes.

When I work on the computer,  I can see chipmonks running back and forth, across the patio.  They are so fast, it is hard to get a photo, but I did manage to catch one stuffing his cheeks with goodies.

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Have a great fall day, wherever you are.

www.CarolSchiffStudio.blogspot.com

Abstract Sunset, Daily Painting, Small Oil Painting, Textured, 14x18 Oil on Canvas

When I think of Florida, I think of the sun rising over the sea.  It's such a special time to spend on the beach.

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Usually, I find myself there alone, with only the soft waves and shore birds to keep me company.  I very special time to  connect with nature and prepare for the day ahead.

detail

With this piece, I used my palette knife to give movement to the painting.

Alcohol Inks

One of the best things about art is that it has many forms and mediums.  I came across a medium new to me called alcohol inks.  They were so much fun and quite a welcome change from oils or collage.  I found the experience frustrating but very freeing.  You really cannot control much except for the colors you use.
The paint has to used on a smooth surface so it slips and slides.  You can control where it goes by moving the tile or using alcohol to try and direct the flow.  Sort of like herding cats.  I really enjoyed it once I realized that most of it was out of my hands.  It was fun putting colors together than trying to guess what I had created.  You can also use stamps or anything else you have lying around to give it interest.
Here are three very different tiles.

I used a music stamp on this tile.
 



This tile reminded me of a landscape with trees and water.

This was just pouring and moving the tile around.


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