I’m sitting on the sofa, feet up on the coffee table. Big exhale…I’m tired, a good tired. Been a good day, spent a lot of hours in the studio. I stocked up on canvases last year. They were on sale locally, 70% off if you bought a case. SEVENTY PERCENT. So I bought them by the case. All different sizes, from 3X4 feet to 5X7 inches. Big fat gallery wrapped canvases. CASES of ‘EM.
Ahhh…
And then I spent the summer and fall painting on wood. That’s just a little bit of it, up above. Plaster and wax (both hot and cold) need a solid substrate. Something that won’t flex and crack. So I built cradled panels, so many I can’t even tell you. I almost sorta forgot about all that canvas. The elephant in the room.
Not any more. The studio is chaos right now. So many works in progress. They’re all in acrylic. Not my favorite medium, not after the juicy lusciousness of oil or the richness of beeswax. And plaster is just plain old fun. But then acrylics mixed into glaze medium and layered and layered and layered and then turned into something magical…ah, I can handle that.
So I spent the day painting backgrounds. Just backgrounds. Random strokes, random colors. Filling the canvas. It’s fun, really. No ego involved, just me and the music. And with all the canvases I have, I could be doing this for the next month. Eventually the paintings will come to me. And when they do, I’ll be ready to go.
For a look at how a painting evolves, check out my recent post ‘Making Peace’.