Monday, August 29, 2011

Art and the elves, boys and girls



That hidden hand or mind or whatever has been at work once again in the latest piece in progress. After uploading the previous post I thought I'd better reshape things into a rough usable form before the paint got too dry, so I got to work and scraped, pushed and shoved until it seemed ready for me to get more focused the next day.

As usual I hung it up on my work-in-progress lounge wall and went about the evening's  routines. So it was only some time later that I realised it was already almost perfect.

Here's how it looked at the time, and below how it was after adding light and dark the next day.


Behind all that huffing and puffing the real creative process had been at work again without my normal conscious mind being aware of it.  The big long strokes and vigorous scrubs I'd intended as a guide to later work had already taken on the essential form of the finished piece, all I had to do was add depth following the shape already laid down.

And try not to bollocks it up.

This appears to be the way this other mind seems to prefer working. It likes it best when the thinking department is occupied with something other than a direct focus on how to apply or remove paint, as it was when scrubbing away. It's as if a space gets cleared somewhere in the creative warehouse because the well-meaning but rather plodding clerk-mind gets called away and the elusive mercurial genius-mind can take the gap and run with it.

Another thing that struck me about this latest piece is how similar it is to the previous one. That too had a stand-back-gobsmacked moment, the time the profile landed all by itself, gifting me with the core of the piece to dance the rest of the painting around.

Like this one, that piece also emerged at the last moment to bump off from the prepared canvas a different idea I'd been about to start work on.

What fascinates me also is that at the time I was obsessed about it being a chick painting and omigod how was I going to hold my head up in the world producing chick art?!? Well, this one's a bru painting. Parity has been found.



Another similarity of opposites is that the first is a woman-shaped gap through which is seen what seems to me like deep galactic space, whereas the second is a small but significant man-shape riding what looks like a wave of light rolling in from those same depths.

Are these two siblings? Are they lovers? Hopefully for painting genetics it's the latter, because already there's been cross-pollination from the Lightsurfer to the Earthen Moon. The coloring and strong free strokes of the surfer dude helped free up some of the angst-laden paintwork in the goddess. Following the momentum of that kinetic energy I reworked some areas, particularly the area behind the head, and at last I'm beginning to look at it with a sense that it feels right.

Now to loosen up those horses...


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