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Variable dimensions

Thursday, December 30th, 2010

It seems that whenever my drawing and painting are getting closer together they shoot off in other directions again.

Drawings, like these, are all I’ve been doing since Christmas. Constructing them is a fairly logical process. I think of them as three-dimensional objects, and by connecting each point they become credible, even though they may give the illusion of impossibility. I like the play between two, and three, dimensions, and how the freehand drawing adds to that. I had the thought to make them in a 3-D modelling program, but I think they would lose a lot. Animating them (again, freehand) is something I want to try.

I’m curious to hear if anyone else reads them as 3-D, because, so far, no one else does! Perhaps I’ve spent too much time playing old-ish videogames.

These are, of course, related to the forms I’ve used in installation, and collage.

Tags:Graphite, Marker, Paper, Polygons
Posted in Drawing, My Work, Opinion / musings | No Comments »

Gathering Intelligence

Sunday, December 5th, 2010

I have three paintings from my Revision series in a group exhibition at Brunswick Arts. The show, Gathering Intelligence, runs until this ~~Tuesday~~ Friday, and includes works in several mediums.

Tags:Exhibition
Posted in My Work, Painting | No Comments »

Two portraits

Saturday, November 20th, 2010

Tags:Abstract, Acrylic, Board, Erin, Green, Oils, Portrait, Red, Revision
Posted in My Work, Painting | No Comments »

Revision

Friday, November 5th, 2010

These are the last two paintings I’ve made. For lack of things to paint on, my dislike of waste, and experimenting in ways to make work, I’ve been going over old paintings, that are either ‘finished’, or at a point I do not want to resolve. These two also happen to feel particularly exciting, to me, at the moment: technically, aesthetically, and conceptually.

Beginning a painting, or a drawing (or collage, or sculpture, or…)—perhaps particularly, but not necessarily exclusively with abstract work—one first has to make sense of the space in front of them. Typically that’s a blank piece of canvas, or paper. This can be done in the head, by pouring paint, by making preparatory sketches, and so on. Always it is a response. When this response is to, not white page, or to an arbitrary shape, but to an image, and one of my own creation—and a failed one at that—that is, conceptualy, a pretty damn interesting starting point. In effect it could be just the same as pouring paint, and maybe that’s all I’ve done with it. But I’m excited about the potential.

Tags:Abstract, Board, Oils, Revision, Yellow
Posted in My Work, Opinion / musings, Painting | No Comments »

Drawing, again

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

Erin Sitting, with Elbow Out [drawing] — Erin Sitting, with Elbow Out

I’ve been wanting to draw again: big charcoal portraits. This is the first one that is okay. I worry so much about not make illustrations when I’m drawing, and this is maybe that. I notice more ‘nice lines, and composition’ rather than ‘a person’.

I’m a bit frustrated with all my work, at the moment. I’m impatient, and it feels like I’m right at the start of everything. The abstract paintings are getting bigger, and are going somewhere, at least. I am looking forward to pushing my drawing. Moving away from line, which I feel very in control of, and trying really dig people out of that page. The carefulness, and tenderness that line can give, I don’t want to lose, but..

I mused today about how controlled my paintings and drawings are. Even in the paintings that start with stains, and thick messes, there are later placed bars and rectangles of single colours. I have a very ordered way of looking at images, that I think comes across most obviously in my videos. I worry about this, too, being too clean, and illustrative (though not in the

Tags:Charcoal, Erin, Paper, Portrait
Posted in Drawing, My Work, Opinion / musings | No Comments »

Someone Else’s House

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

So, me and Erin have an exhibition opening next Wednesday, October 27, at Blindside Artist Run Space.

Our piece is two videos, both of the last place I lived in, on my last day there. Both were filmed without the other there, or even with knowledge that the other had filmed. So both are natural responses to the leaving of a home, and its transition into someone else’s. They loop, but have different lengths, so there are moments that sit well, and moments that jar, and these change over time.

Andrew David Stapleton’s catalogue essay (archived) makes clear the themes far better than I can, ~~and I will update this post when Blindside’s site has it up.~~

You can watch Erin’s half of the video on Youtube. One of us will upload the exhibition version once everything’s all up and running. And, now, you can see a 25 minute excerpt of the one we had exhibited, via Erin’s Vimeo account.

Opening night is Thursday, 28th.

In other fine news: I received a globe for my film projector today, and got it all working (after mangling a bit of the Popeye film I ended up with). I’m very, very, much looking forward to uploading all the amateur films I’ve been collecting to Youtube, and Lost Discarded Abandoned.

Tags:Collaboration, Erin, Exhibition, Lost Discarded Abandoned
Posted in My Work, Video | No Comments »