The start of another picture. I sometimes wonder whether I start too many pictures. I certainly don’t finish enough..

I was reading a book on Flemish painting techniques the other night. They didn’t half layer! Made me feel slightly better about my constant changing of paintings even if my layering and that of the Flemish painters are the result of very different motivations. In their case they fixed the drawing very early and layered on color and shade while in my stuff I always feel like I’m hunting the drawing and effectively stop painting when I’ve found it (or given up)
Anyway I like the names they gave their layers. One’s called the dead layer. I’m currently applying a dead layer to everything I’ve got going in the studio!

I don’t think I can remember making a painting that I didn’t rework fairly drastically after having left it for a while and got to know it a bit better This one is no exception. Still some way to go.

This picture took a turn when I got back to it mid week. The guns went as did remnants of colour. Happy to see the back of both! The guns especially. I know nothing about guns had no real appetite to look at any in order to do them justice. Happily removing them has an interesting, and I think entirely good effect! The scene turns from a simple folk fantasy to something a little more complex and threatening. Happy accidents are often spoken about in relation to painting, usually in reference to random marks or spilt paint, less often in relation to this sort of thing when the ingredients of a painting are shuffled or changed with surprising effect.

I’ve been meaning to make some little paintings of people just standing or walking. This is the first.

It seems to be a time of revision. Picked this up today and found revising the drawing of the group on the left immensely satisfying. They have a bit more weight, better attitudes. I’m happy about it.

I wasn’t happy with the last iteration of this so am trying to salvage it. Often its not worth trying to save a bad painting but sometimes it is, and for whatever reason I thought this was worth another go. I’ve always liked the subject and the setup but never resolved the treatment or the drawing. There was too much in some areas too little in others. The surface was pretty dull. It’s better now I think, an interesting crunchy surface, the woman is a little more resolved. I think I know what I’m doing with it now. Good Good.

I’ve been laying on the white, trying again to dry out the imagery and remove the drama. I don’t know if deadpan and lightweight are are good goals but they’re the ones I’m targeting!

I’ve been fiddling with this. Its like a battle between lines and tone. I like lines (especially black ones) and I like tone, they describe different things and operate according to different rules but it can be good, I think, when they jostle together in the one painting. In the fullness of time one of them might win out, we’ll see.