Today, my class were separated into groups of focuses we were doing for the quarter. My friends and I were put into the painters group and had to base our paintings off of ideas and thoughts that came up when watching an animation called "The Illusionist".
The majority of the group voted for painting with oil pastels, I was conflicted about this only because I have never used oil paint before but I have heard some people say it is difficult.
We started out with some Windsor and Newton Artisan Water Based Oil paint, which included one tube of paint. Only for testing how it feels and getting use to the paint were we allowed to use the paint for. The three objects which we were to paint where a speaker, a boot, and a CD radio. The reason was, there were all black...or dark colored.
Oh my goodness it was one of the most difficult painting sessions of my high school life. I have never met a paint that was so stubborn and disagreeable. Unfortunately I have to adjust.
The kind of paint or style I am use to is more of a controlled, detailed environment. With oil paint I had to cut my comfortable zone up into little pieces and chuck them out the window.
What I thought would be more of the painful part would be the erasing I would have to do at the end of every painting I produced. On the flip side I actually enjoyed that part the most.
Personally I thought the speaker was the simplest but not the most interesting thing to paint. Next was the radio, I found it more entertaining to paint that instead because where was more of an interesting shape and shading to it with its arranged dark and lights. The most difficult was the boot. I found that at a certain angle it was not that bad to draw, very interesting. But the first time I drew the side view of the boot where you get to see the full shape of it, the boot suddenly turned into my worst oil paint enemy. The constant dark-grey color it had made it hard to differentiate the boot from the laces, or the rubber, or the cloth. To me, in the end, my drawing of the boot became a blob of oil paint. Not that a blob is a completely bad thing
You're used to seeing lines, copying line drawings, dealing with only lines, and then adding color over and around those lines. Now you are dealing with actual objects, which do not have lines at all, but instead are composed of shapes. This is a big mental shift for you. Stick with it.
ReplyDeleteI think your problems with the paint are more the brush - I gave you guys all big, stiff, bristle brushes. They fight back a bit. Art is not without a struggle.