I made this last week. It measures 24″ x 20″:
I’m using two layers of silk instead of four or five. With this technique the line becomes clearer; it’s a more graphic approach. When I finished this piece my initial feeling was that it was too literal. But it’s growing on me.
I labored more than I have in a while with this one. Here’s a sequence of how the work developed. At first I was using five layers depicting two figures in a pink environment. Towards the end of the process I edited it down to two layers, added a figure, and put them in a yellow environment:
I’m never completely sure how the individual figures will come out. So I don’t have total control over them. But what this piece taught me is that what I do have control over is composition.
Here are four smaller pieces using two layers:
The delicacy and abstraction of the pink one is intriguing to me. I’m coming to terms with the fact that less can be more. My knee-jerk reaction is to add more layers thinking that that is how I will achieve depth and luminosity. But I’m surprised with how much depth I can get using fewer layers.
I also have reworked the 48″ x 36″ piece that I wrote about on my last post. Here’s what it initially looked like:
At first I thought that the surface texture was taking away from the piece. But then I grew to like the texture. I realized that I in fact had it the other way around; the image was taking away from the surface quality rather than the surface quality taking away from the image. So I added a rich, dark brown silk layer over the painting to mute the figure:
It may be too subtle. But the longer I sit with it the more the figure emerges.
