I've been working on this painting continuously since I first posted an image of it July 1 (by continuously, I really do mean 24/7, of course). The paper just couldn't take any more physical contact -- it had become extremely abraded and fuzzy -- so I switched over to using an airbrush and painted it in many layers alternating between a deep blue-black acrylic in the mid to dark areas and white in the light to mid areas. That beefed up the color in the abraided (dark)areas. The development of color, texture (quite genuine sculptural texture, albeit fuzzy), an unusual impasto, and a kind of battle between white and black through all the layers of light and dark is VERY INTERESTING to me and has stimulated me to move in some new (actually ancient -- I'm thinking mid-value ground with light and dark scribbles defining the image out of the mids, like renaissance chalk drawing, maybe) directions which I'll continue to experiment with later this summer.

In the meanwhile, gentle reader (always wanted to write that somewhere -- now seems as good a time as any, right?), here's the current (and final) state of the painting I first showed in my July 1 post...

Self Portrait, 43 x 27 inches, July 10, 2007, painting in acrylics on Rives BFK

Self Portrait, 43 x 27 inches, July 10, 2007, painting in acrylics on Rives BFK

-- Mike

Labels: drawing, painting

¶ 6:56 PM