Saturday, March 05, 2011

Spring Break-Week 6

here is the big painting finished for now. I'm starting spring break and another painting this weekend, and I'll have a new large size painting ready to go plus some smaller ones.

I had a lot of fun doing this painting and a lot of support and positive feedback from all of my friends as well as my teachers and critics at school. I think one of the things that gets lost fast in the art world is the word fun, which really is sad. I mean we all became artists because we thought it would be FUN to be someone who drew or painted sculpted, photographed, etc. Sure, at times it can be the most maddening and frustrating pleasure to fight with your creation and your ego, your skill level etc.

I know doing the study of the painting and having that to work with was a major aid in working on the larger painting as I solved many problems before the big canvas was started. paper vs canvas, think vs thick, so many ideas from the study that had to be reinterpreted into the big painting. A mark on the study which was a fingernail was now 6 inches and applied with a palette knife the size of a spakeling trowel. It was a fight to keep what was in the study but to also give the larger painting what it needed and so there were always these aesthetic decisions being made all along the way. This is where the advice my teachers like Renee, Scott and Vince came in really handy.

4 comments:

Ed McKeogh said...

Count me among those who find this painting amazing! Subject matter and execution dovetail perfectly. Makes me wish I were there (I have a strange fascination with derelict, abandoned places). Thanks for sharing the work and your thoughts about the process.

William R. Moore said...

Mike,
Wow 45" x 85", This is a great interior painting. I really like all the different light effects.

I went back through your Summer 2009 series of Super Sad paintings and studies looking for an explanation of a concept for Super Sad, but I couldn't find one. Would you give an explanation?
I really like all of those 2009 studies.

Bill Dunn said...

WOW! Nice work Mike! One of these days I'll have to get back to doing more oil painting.

Mike Manley said...

Thanks fellas. William, I don't know if I want to spill my beans on this, but I think you might be able to figure out some of the meaning behind the SS series. I'm not trying to be coy, but I think too often when the artist explains it all it leave the viewer with a very specific way to look at and think about a painting and I think that lessens the viewers participation and their interchange with the work.