Hey ya –
Boy oh howdy, is this one exploding off the pages! Particularly exuberant brush work. I wish I was this on the beam all the time!
Happy day!
PS: Click it to make it bigger – – –
Flowering #144
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Good Morning All –
It was so much fun to do a drippy, streaky, I-don’t-know-what’s-going-to happen-next kind of picture. Actually, I did several – and am going to do more.
Have the finest, creative Tuesday –
Your Buddy Bill
PS: Click it to make it bigger!
Flowering #147
India ink on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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There are a whole bunch of versions of this picture. I’ve stuck with a super simple composition (big flower up close – smaller or more distant bloom at top left), and taken it through all kinds of change ups in mark handling, how (or where) to go light or dark, and what to do with texture. I might even have enough so they can have a whole picture album to themselves. I’ll start fiddling with a virtual version of that soon, so you’ll see it about 10 minutes after that!
I’ve managed some wonderful textures and layers here. To make this picture bigger, click it!
Flowering #91
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Maybe this bloom of mine is sad that summertime is so far off? Me too.
Click it to make it bigger!
Flowering #86
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Some day soon, all the bushes and trees will bloom like this!
Click the pic to make it bigger!
Flowering #67
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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The longer (and closer) you look at this, the more beguiling it becomes. It’s odd. And it’s more than a little awkward, yet the diversity of my mark making, and the build up of textures leaves you with more and more to discover. I find that so satisfying!
Make it big, and wander around in it for a moment – click the pic.
Flowering #135
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Sometimes I fall so in love with how my marks dance in their space and around each other, that I don’t care whether it’s really a flower or not! I think this one is though – up close. Or is it see through? Dunno – it’s just nice.
No post tomorrow – hence today’s bonus painting!
Get close – click the pic!
Flowering #126
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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This one is as much abstract mark making as flowering plant. A NICE play off between bold and delicate, all tied together by lots of happenstance and plenty of visual artifact.
Click the picture and look close – worth it!
Flowering #59
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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One of these will go in my dragon fly painting album (see it here). I just don’t know which to choose! Like each of ’em, but they’re too similar to include both. Or so I’m thinking. Hmmmm. . .
Øyenstikkere (Dragonflies) #18
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Øyenstikkere (Dragonflies) #20
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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I particularly like this – a mix of wonderful textures and spare, very minimal moves. Plenty of character here, without much window dressing. Success!
Click the picture and look close!
Flowering #59
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Here’s another one with the same idea as yesterday – blooming branches – but taken further into exuberant imagination!
Click this painting to see it really big!
Flowering #113
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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I really like branches in bloom – maybe we should go clip and bring in either pussy willows or forsythias. We could put ’em in water and watch a little bit of Spring truly come early!
Click this painting to make the blooms really big!
Flowering #64
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Heads up!
I’ve managed to put together a digital test album of 12 dragonfly paintings I’ve done for my Sweetie. Now I can see how it might look before I make it for real – and so can you – CLICK HERE!
This is my first attempt, so there are still small glitches, but you probably won’t notice ’em. Pretty soon, quite a few more digital albums will be appearing, as I begin figuring out which of the 140 or so flower paintings I’ve so far finished will also go into albums! Very exciting stuff!
Well hey there!
I showed you a quick studio snapshot of this a couple of weeks ago – which did it no justice whatsoever. This scanned version is much better! I don’t know how I managed such gorgeous wings, because they were done in frantic mode. I was moving too fast to think!
Øyenstikkere (Dragonflies) #26
India ink, inked collage and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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This painting started out as miserable attempt at a damsel fly. I was so disgusted I pitched in a corner. The next morning though, I picked it up again and with nothing to loose, decided to see just how far I could push scrubbing and sanding out the failed damselfly before slamming another round of ink down on top. The answer is WOW!
Even though my paper usually hangs on to some record of the marks I make (I frequently scrape and scar it), I can take away a lot more than I ever imagined, and the ghost-like remnants become wonderful, surprising textures in their own right.
Somehow, in the frenzy of brutalizing these sheets, incredible wings blossomed. They have more dimension, suggestion and texture than almost any passage I’ve ever managed – in any picture!
This was teetering on disaster painting at it’s most panicked! The big, black swipe of ink in the lowest wing actually hides most of the previous damselfly’s terrible body. Even as I slammed it down, I remember thinking, “S–t, that’s too much – now what’ll I do?” Fingers and thumbs were ground into the sodden, buckling surface, horribly distorting it. Ink was pressed clean through and scrubbed back up again. Bits of paper were ripped up and glued back down. I even left holes that were later backed with blackened paper that shows through. All of it worked, and I don’t know why or how, at least not yet. But I suspect I may be headed towards a lot more of this kind of thing. Most of what I know, I’ve learned experientially, and it takes its own time to sink in.
Hey, just for fun, here’s a little diagram that shows you where the remnants of the lost damselfly are still visible!
Sometimes, my pictures are a lot less whacky! In fact, they might even be a little elegant.
There’s as much room for nuance and and expression in a personal visual language as there is in any other language you can think of!
Click it to make it bigger – you’ll enjoy it!
Flowering #57
India ink, inked collage and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Good Morning!
Almost every mark and move in this one does the unexpected. Yet it stays together! I don’t often reach a level where intuition and autopilot are so in sync. When it happens, it’s a wonderful few moments – always a gift.
Enjoy the day –
Your Buddy Bill
Flowering #78
India ink on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Just a fun one this morning! Click it to make it bigger and take a closer look!
Flowering #45
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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There are some particularly lovely happenstances in this picture.
I made the lined/grooved stem in this picture with a broken piece of hair comb. As I scraped it up and then veered down and to the right, it picked up and carried some of the wet, dark ink I first dragged it through. When using a comb (or anything else that makes a regular, repeated pattern or texture), there’s every likelihood that it’ll look horribly mechanical. It can kill a picture. But false starts are worth it when now and then marks turn out a little scrubbed and ragged – in other words, with a ton of character.
There’s something else strange here. After I dried the stem marks, I slapped down a few broad, rapid, very wet strokes of clean water to make a puddle where the bloom would be. Then I scraped and ground an ink charged brush collet (all of its fibers were worn off) back through the puddle to make the lines that delineate the petals. Some of that ink also bled/blended into the puddle to make the wonderful, liquid grays. Here’s what’s odd: even though my water puddle originally covered the end of the flower’s stem, the dark, dry ink from those marks somehow created a mild resist that forced the puddle back. Thus there is a white halo around them that shouldn’t really be there. I don’t understand why this happens but I’ve seen it before. I’m trying to figure it out, or at the very least, learn to harness the effect, because it’s beautifully cool!
Stay Snug –
Your Buddy Bill
A tip: this looks really great when enlarged – click on the image!
Flowering #50
India ink and surface alteration on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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Why am I so stoked to pound out pictures today? It’s because we declared a stop day on Saturday (and a little bit of yesterday too)! We went out to breakfast, took morning walks and pushed all the living room furniture out of the way to set this up!
Snow outside = champagne, brownies, good books, an iPad, plenty of snuggling with my Sweetie, a nap or two – and two cats that liked their new jungle-gym!
This morning, a further evolution of yesterday’s painting. Rare is the picture anymore that doesn’t end up in at least a few variations.
Wind whistling out – sun’s not yet up, and it’s as cold out as it sounds in the darkness. I think I’ll be an ink slinger today and stay up here where it’s snug.
Tomorrow a different bloom –
Your Buddy Bill
A tip: it’s worth it to enlarge this one – click on it!
Flowering #85
India ink on paper – two sheets = 14″ x 21″
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