A Portrait of Betty McMillan

23 December 2015, 7am

I just realised this painting had never been put up on my blog, so here it is.

It's a perversion of a well-known portrait. I did it because I thought I could learn something from the process. I did. So many oil layers I lost count. The razor has removed Marcel Duchamp’s mustache (is this the beginning of post-post-post-modernism?). What’s that in the background? Notice anything else unusual?

 

"A Portrait of Betty McMillan"
530x770       22/2/2005

It's the same size as the original. Why Betty McMillan? Contrast.

Texas Crude

19 December 2015, 11.00am

Finished off the Texas paintings with a coat of oil. I decided to not refer to the photos I’d taken and just use my new colour wheel to find the appropriate pigments for the final coat. It was unchartered territory for me, and very rewarding. I feel like my painting is finally approaching where I’ve been trying to push it over many years. Thanks to acrylics, of all things. Who’d a thunk it?

The first two were a bit flat, no doubt because I washed a lot of the acrylic ground off. I even put a second coat of oil on this first painting to try and lift it. Because it was so slick, the oil beaded on the surface and resulted in a random texturing.

“Silver Bend”

900x600          17/12/2015

“Pegasus”

900x600          12/12/2015

“Two Sheds”

900x600          17/12/2015

“Texan”

900x600          11/12/2015

Smoko

19 December 2015, 10.30am

A short postscript to my last. Some items gifted to me by Jill. An elegant scarf for the ladies, made by Francois of gay Paree in sturdy rayon –

And some smoking fun for the kiddies –

Smoke Signals

Thursday 8 December 2015, 3.30pm

I’ve spent the last four days working on an obsessive graphite drawing (on a gesso panel). It’s an idea that’s been simmering for a few years, and then on Saturday on the way home from Texas, I spotted an old advertising sign for sale in Warwick. It was just right for my devious purpose.

I’d been thinking (as a smoker) how attitudes to cigarettes had changed over the years. In the 50’s, if you went to a social gathering you were considered unsociable if you didn’t smoke. Hosts would stock up on fags, even if they didn’t smoke themselves. Strangers would offer one as a sign of friendliness, assuming, like most people, that you smoked. Now we have plain packaging and the social shunning of smokers. Social Norm to social outcast in 50 years.

This is the result of my musings.

“Smoke Signals”

900x600          8/12/2015

Some details –

No animals were harmed in the making of this artwork, but I probably infringed a few copyrights. It’s been fun taking the piss out of the wowsers.

Miles and Miles of Texas

Saturday 5 December 2015, 7pm

Fletcher and I set out on Thursday morning to do some work around Texas. Chris particularly wanted to draw the Texas silver mine, the local ecological disaster-in-waiting, and I was interested in a bend in the road nearby.

We got to work. I was determined to do a few larger scale acrylic underpaintings to be ‘oiled’ later on in the studio, in the same fashion as ‘Gragin Peak’ (see earlier post). I’d kind of lost interest in charcoal, after seeing what a layer of oil can do to a layer of acrylic. I was sailing unchartered waters and enjoying it. Makes me feel young again.

So my work was all acrylic underpainting (most of Chris’ was underdawing), using the complementaries of the actual colours, more or less. My new pigment wheel wasn’t dry when I left, so I didn’t use it.

When we arrived on site, I discovered that I hadn’t brought a 40mm wide brush that I thought I’d packed, so ended up using a 3/4'’ filbert.

“Silver Bend”

900 x 600        3/12/2015

I wasn’t quite happy with it at the end, so I put it under the water tap on my ute and scrubbed it a bit with a non-stick scourer to bring back a bit more light (higher key).

So we rode across the (shire) border into Texas and found the natives friendly.

I painted the servo, with the flying red horse prancing above it.

“Pegasus”

900 x 600        3/12/2015

When I finished it, I got a little gentler and washed it with a rag. Feeling a bit more confident. Try finding a tap in the wild in Texas. You can’t. Had to refill my drink bottle from the public dunny basin tap in the end and use that. The most notable effect of this was that the green paint was washed clean off the flying horse, in spite of the fact that it was one of the first things I painted, so should have been dry. I think it’s trying to tell me something.

I was starting to appreciate the crudity of the acrylic medium, it was reminiscent of the primitive quality of large chunks of charcoal.

Seen in the Texas Art Gallery –

We set up camp in the free campground on the banks of the Dumaresq River, enjoying a nice current with some flows from Glenlyon Dam, with ducks often scudding past us.

Like me, Chris is attracted by brutalist architecture in an idyllic setting. This is his take on the campsite –

“Dumaresq”

Next morning, after a few stiff coffees, we moseyed out of town and headed for a couple of choice compositions that we’d spotted on the way down.

“Sheds”

900 x 600        4/12/2015

I'd learnt to keep more of the gesso showing through, so that I didn't need to wash it. Chris was busy about a hundred yards further up the hill –

“Shed on the Hill”

“Hill Under Shed”

I moved on a bit further –

“Texan”

900 x 600        4/12/2015

And Chris did another underdrawing –

“Study for a Figure in a Landscape”

We had a great time and got a lot done. Looking forward to oiling-up those paintings.

Chris was disappointed with his drawings of the mine and was relieved when I talked about how focussing on the narrative can kill the energy of an artwork. I suggested he approach it allegorically, which he’s good at. Be interesting to see what he comes up with…………

I ran out of fuel on the way home as I crossed the threshold into the servo in Stanthorpe, rolling unpowered right to the pump. Second time that's happened with this ute. Reliable.

For those who’ve asked, I’ve replaced the crappy photo of my Pigment Reference Spectral Wheel in the last post. On the other hand, if you want a better choice of quality, you can find the largest file (5.12MB) at

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qwcg44sdhpmqhvi/Pigment%20Reference%20Spectrum.jpg?dl=0

You can find a medium-sized file (1.9MB) at

https://www.dropbox.com/s/dtoiep55v0fthgd/Pigment%20Reference%20Spectrum_medium.jpg?dl=0

And a small one (1.1MB) at

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qwcg44sdhpmqhvi/Pigment%20Reference%20Spectrum.jpg?dl=0

I’ve passed 5,000 pageviews! Yay!

Complementary Pigments Part 2

30 November 2015, 6pm

This is another post for the artist-nerd, not one for the average punter.

I’ve spent a few days reorganising my palette reference boards in an obsessive fashion to refine and simplify my use of complementary pigments. My old palette reference boards were no help in this respect, and getting rather obscure and grotty after many years of constant use and abuse.

So I started from scratch and listed in spectral order, as closely as I could, the 102 colour pigments at my disposal. I used as my basis the Maunsell colour wheel (see previous post). Here it is super-imposed on a modern colour spectrum.

And here’s the list of pigments, excluding the earths, which are all neutralised. It’s as close as I could arrange it, I’m sure there’s a few mistakes, but near enough is good enough in this case.

The ‘AS’ and so on refer to the manufacturer. The colour of pigments can vary considerably from one brand to another and it can be quite useful for some colours to have them in more than one make. Also, some pigments can be totally different if used thinly or thickly. For instance, Art Spectrum’s Australian Red Gold is red-orange if thick, but yellow if thin.

The colours, such as “BLUE” are in inverted commas to indicate that they are conceptual words, and not accurately descriptive of real pigments, which always contain impurities. Some pigments come close to being pure colours, but not many. After all, they’re just ground-up bits of rocks and chemicals.

ALLA PRIMA COLOUR WHEEL

----------------------------------------“BLUE”-----------------------------------------

Antwerp Blue                                       WN

Tasman Blue                                         AS

Cobalt Blue                                          WN

Primary Blue                                         LF+B

-----------------------------------------“B-BP”-------------------------------------

Windsor Blue – Green Shade                WN

Cobalt Blue                                          AS

-----------------------------------------“PB”-------------------------------------

Antwerp Blue                                       AS

Prussian Blue                                        AS

Ultramarine Blue                                   AS

French Ultramarine                               WN

French Ultramarine                               R

French Ultramarine                               AS

-----------------------------------------“PB-P”-------------------------------------

Mauve  Blue Shade                               WN

-----------------------------------------“PURPLE”-------------------------------------

Cobalt Violet Dark                               WN

Permanent Mauve                                 AS

Mauve, Red Shade                               WN

Lilac                                                     AS

Flinders Blue Violet                              AS

Permanent Mauve                                 WN

Flinders Red Violet                               AS

------------------------------------------“P-BP”-----------------------------------------

Magenta                                               WN

Cadmium Deep Red                             AS

Permanent Crimson                              AS

Spectrum Crimson, Alizarin Hue           AS

Cadmium Red Deep                             WN

Rose Dore                                            AS

Bright Red 144                                     WN

--------------------------------------------“RP”-----------------------------------------

Bright Red 141                                    WN

Spectrum Red                                      AS

-------------------------------------------“R-PR”----------------------------------------

Cadmium Red                                      WN

-------------------------------------------“RED”-----------------------------------------

Cadmium Red                                      AS

------------------------------------------“YR-Y”---------------------------------------

Flesh Tint                                             WN

-------------------------------------------“YR”---------------------------------------- 

Flesh Tint                                             R

Naples Yellow Reddish                        AS

Australian Red Gold                             AS

Chrome Orange                                   WN

-----------------------------------------“YR-Y”-------------------------------------

Cadmium Orange                                 WN

Italian Pink                                           AS

Cadmium Yellow                                  WN

Cadmium Yellow                                  AS

Spectrum Yellow                                  AS

Indian Yellow                                       AS

Chrome Yellow                                    WN

Chrome Yellow Hue                             WN

----------------------------------------“YELLOW”---------------------------------------

Aureolin                                               AS

----------------------------------------“Y-GY”---------------------------------------

Zinc Yellow                                          WN

Chrome Lemon                                    WN

Yellow Light                                         Arch

Lemon Yellow                                      WN

Lemon Yellow                                      AS

Chrome Green Light                             WN

Spectrum Green Light                           AS

Australian Green Gold                          AS

----------------------------------------“GY”---------------------------------------

Australian Leaf Green Light                   AS

Australian Leaf Green Dark                  AS

Olive Green                                          AS       ?

Terre Verte Traditional                         AS

Terre Verte                                          R

----------------------------------------“GY-G”---------------------------------------

Sap Green                                            AS

Cadmium Green                                   WN

Oxide of Chromium                              AS

Oxide of Chromium                              WN

Permanent Green Light                         WN

Prussian Green                                     WN

Terre Verte                                          AS

----------------------------------------“GREEN”---------------------------------------

Windsor Emerald                                  WN

----------------------------------------“G-BG”---------------------------------------

Spectrum Viridian                                 AS

Pthalo Green                                        AS

Windsor Green                                    WN

----------------------------------------“BG”---------------------------------------

Australian Leaf Green – Bluish               AS

Cobalt Green                                        AS

----------------------------------------“BG-B”---------------------------------------

Cerulean                                               AS

Cerulean                                               WN

Sapphire                                               AS

Manganese Blue                                   WN

Indigo                                                   AS

Indigo Blue (Perm. Hue)                       AS

----------------------------------------“BLUE”-----------------------------------------

And here’s the list of earths –

EARTHS

----------------------------------------------"BLUE"----------------------------------

Madder Brown Aliz                  WN

Madder Brown                         R

Pilbara Red                              AS

Venetian Red                            R

Mars Violet                              WN

(Mars Red)

Light Red                                 WN

Mars Orange                            WN

----------------------------------------------RED------------------------------------

Transparent Red Oxide AS

Burnt Sienna                             WN

Burnt Sienna                             AS

Brown Pink                              AS

Australian Grey                        AS

Burnt Umber                            AS

Transparent Brown Earth          AS

Burnt Umber                            WN

Raw Umber                              R

Raw Umber                              AS

Vandyke Brown                       AS

Raw Sienna                              R                     

Transparent Gold Oxide           AS

Raw Sienna                              WN

Raw Sienna                              AS

Mars Yellow                            WN

Yellow Ochre                           AS

Naples Yellow                          WN

Naples Yellow                          AS

Australian Red Gold                 AS       ?

Italian Pink                               AS

------------------------------------------YELLOW----------------------------------

And my new pigment reference board looks like this (updated 5 Dec) –

The strip on the left is the earths (I’m afraid my pic doesn’t do them justice), while the wheel has my ‘clean’ colours. Now I can easily look from one side of the wheel to the diametrically placed side to find the best candidates to choose for the complimentary. As well as the contrast of the complimentary, it helps me find harmonies easily. The earths can be used in combination with the wheel in a similar fashion. The earths range from those with a blue impurity, through red, to yellow. Should take a bit of the guesswork out of pigment selection, and it’ll be interesting to see how it affects the quality of my paintings. I might yet go back to the (arbitrary) conventional colour wheel.

Complementary Pigments

Tuesday, 24 November 2015, 6pm.

I prepared this post for those artists who exploit complementary colours, whether mixing or glazing them to make darks, layering them to generate energy, or side-by-side to create colour contrasts.

I’m using the Maunsell colour wheel as my base. From ‘The Art of Colour and Design’ by Maitland Graves, recommended to me long ago by Rod Milgate, and a bible of mine ever since. Unlike conventional colour wheels, this one is based on the actual wavelength of the hue. The distance between red and yellow is half that of the other primaries. In effect, the wheel is divided into five sections, (blue to purple/purple to red/red to yellow/yellow to green/green to blue) rather than the conventional six (blue to purple/purple to red/red to orange/orange to yellow/yellow to green/green to blue). Blue/orange (which is listed as YR) is the only complementary alignment that this wheel shares with conventional colour wheels.

In the following image, I’ve put a complementary arrangement of colours inside the Maunsell colour wheel. All I’ve done is rotate the original wheel 180 degrees to align the outer colours with their inner complements. I apologise for the inaccurate colour representation, it comes from a very old colour photocopy. But you get the general idea.

That’s all very well for colour, but what about actual pigments, bits of ground-up rock and chemicals? This list of commonly used pigments is as close as I can come to an actual colour wheel and the associated complemantary pigments. Backslashes indicate approximate hue equivalence. Of course, most secondaries can be mixed, rather than using alla prima pigments. Tone is ignored in this list.

PIGMENT                                        COMPLEMENTARY

Cadmium Yellow (medium)                               Ultramarine

Cadmium Yellow Light                                      Ultramarine/Alizarin Crimson mix/

Lemon Yellow                                                  Cobalt Violet Dark

Australian Green Gold                                      Flinders Blue Violet/Indigo

Terre Verte

Australian Leaf Green Light                              Alizarin Crimson

Sap Green

Permanent Green Light                                     Spectrum Crimson/Cadmium Red Deep

Prussian Green

Oxide of Chromium

Cadmium Green                                               Cadmium Red

Manganese Blue

Cerulean Blue/Pthalo Blue                                Chrome Orange

Tasman Blue                                                    

Cobalt Blue                                                     Cadmium Orange

Antwerp Blue/Prussian Blue                             Camium Red and Cadmium Yellow mix

Ultramarine                                                      Cadmium Yellow (medium)

And so we come full circle.

One thing to note is the preponderance of greens in my palette. I’m a landscape painter at heart.

Glazed Siding Springs

Sunday 22 November, 10am

This is what the Siding Springs ink/watercolour looks like after getting a coat of #3 Oil Medium.

The decrease in light scatter has deepened the contrast and crisped up the image.

Siding Springs

Tuesday 17 November, 11am.

I’m organising an artist residency at Siding Springs next year, to do some work based on the equipment and people who work there.

One of the problems with this is that many areas are sensitive to dust, so using charcoal is often a no-no. I needed to find a way of working that doesn’t generate any dust. I decided to try working on my usual gesso panels with black ink and watercolour, using a large oil painting brush for the ink, a soft 2” brush for the watercolour and a rag for smoothing the wet media. I used some photos (against my better judgement) I took when last there to make this painting –

“The 3.9 Metre Light Bucket at Siding Springs”

17/11/2015      900x600

It looked a bit flat when I finished painting, so I used sandpaper and sgraffito to reintroduce some whites (can’t do that with paper). I’ll have to avoid those during the residency. It’s a bit tight, but what else can you do with a highly technical subject? The finish is also flat and the darks don’t have much depth. I’m thinking of glazing it with oil media to remedy that.

Not too sure about the public service ochre on the horseshoe bearing – I would have gone for Monza red.

Just Plain Loco

5 November 2015, 10am

Instead of my usual day at SDSR yesterday (welding and grinding), I thought I’d have a go at a portrait of our beloved, but tired, loco. She needs new pistons, rings and liners. Anyone out there got a 17” rebuild kit?

“A Portrait of C17 No.971”

4/11/2015        910x610

It was built by Walkers of Maryborough in 1951, which makes us contemporaries.

A Weekend in Warialda

Saturday 31 October 2015, 3pm

I spent last weekend on an arty expedition to Warialda with fellow artist Chris Fletcher. We arrived in Warialda at 9am after I took a wrong turn near Texas, which cost us an hour.

After a burger for breakfast (yuck), we set off to look for Gragin Peak, crossing Murdering Creek along the way. Might have a fraught history. I’d bought some acrylics (also yuck!) and wanted to try some plein-air painting without using charcoal, which I hadn’t attempted in many years. The crudeness of the acrylic layer turned out to be an asset. It produced a much clumsier image than I would have produced with oils. I finished it from memory with oils over the top a couple of days ago. It has a rather tenuous connection with reality.

“Gragin Peak”

24/10/2015      600x450

Fletcher perversely ignored the obvious peak and did a stunner of the fields –

We moved on to get a distant view of the peak from the highway, stopping at a farm and getting permission to draw from their hill. This time Chris went for the obvious.

I ignored the attractions of the silos and drew the view –

“Twin Peaks”

24/10/2015      910x610

So late in the afternoon we found ourselves at Cranky Rock Recreation Reserve and realised we didn’t need to go anywhere else for the rest of the weekend. I started by tackling the massive rocks on the other side of the creek from the high viewing platform –

“Cranky Rocks”

24/10/2015      610x910

Chris tackled the same view later that night –

while I stayed put and drew the campground –

“Cranky Bins”

24/10/2015      910x610

“Cranky Trees”

24/10/2015      910x610

Next morning I was feeling a bit seedy, but managed to get started with a track near the viewing platform, followed by Warialda Creek –

“Cranky Track”

25/10/2015      910x610

“Cranky Creek”

25/10/2015      610x910

That night I drove back up the track to draw a field that had taken my fancy. Balls of sheet lightning were busy in the distance –

“Cranky Lightning”

25/10/2015      910x610

The lighter marks in the closest field were made by my clothes dragging across the charcoal. Chaos is my friend again. Later on, back in the camp I attacked Chris as he worked –

“Cranky Chris”

25/10/2015      600x450

“Cranky Camp”

25/10/2015      600x450

Tony the Tasmaniac's hand-crafted camper -

 

That naughty toxic waste mine near Texas -

I’m not feeling too well.