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Saturday, January 05, 2008

An Apple A Day


An Apple A Day, originally uploaded by diahn.


There's nothing like finishing your painting for the week at the last possible moment of the week. 11:45 pm and I just finished. I've also got 2 others in the works, so I think it was a productive day!

Okay - get ready - I think I'm having an epiphany over here. Have you ever worked really hard at trying to be something and then you do something else and you wonder if maybe you should concentrate on that instead? Here's the thing - I work really hard on my acrylic paintings. I LIKE them, but every now and then, I wonder why I'm not doing this kind of thing every day.

This is gouache on paper - not acrylic on canvas. Linda filled a palette up for me when she bought some gouache a few days back (yes, she really is that kind and wonderful...I'm completely blown away by her generosity.) So - I thought, while I waited for the layers to dry on the acrylic painting I'm doing, I would work on this painting - just to pass the time and play a little. Not serious work - that's the stuff on the canvas.

Well.

I love it. I got finished and I loved it. I loved painting it. I slung some paint around and got it on my jeans and I loved it.

And then I added another glaze of paint to my acrylic painting. And then I came back to my desk and flung some more paint.

Hmmm.

Thoughts, anyone? Can one be both a paint flinger and a meticulous layer builder? Am I developing some sort of artistic multiple personality disorder. Is it a psychartic break?

Sorry.

This obviously bears much more experimentation and thinking. I started this apple with the thought that I would incorporate it into a larger, acrylic mixed media canvas, but I like it too much to ruin it. I think I'll go have a mat cut for it and frame it. It's 7 x 10.5, by the way.

It's late.

I'll go ponder this while I drift off to sleep. Thanks for listening...

12 comments:

  1. Yipee! Awesome apple! ANd of COURSE one can be a happy paint flinger and slinger AND a meticulous layer builder. (I refer to Andrew Wyeth for one, who could not only do some serious WC paint slinging, but then fling the entire paper down onto the ground so he could begin another painting right away -- and at the same time he produced an average of only 1-2 paintings a YEAR in egg tempera, he was that meticulous in his layer building. I think it was egg tempera ... something like that at least.)
    Really -- you have to do something while the layers dry. And I think you've found your something! This is awesome!

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  2. Yum! This is absolutely gorgeous!!!! Wow, your colors are so vivid!

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  3. First of all, this apple is absolutely luscious-looking and my mouth is watering.
    Second, you certainly have found a niche with these paints.
    Third of all, why can't you have it both ways?! It obviously works well for you.
    Oh, and fourth, I really believe anything nice about Linda :)

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  4. Wow - this is so juicy it jumped off the monitor at me!

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  5. Anonymous3:22 PM

    stunning. the apple is bursting from all these colors and i want to have a bite!

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  6. I think you are in ecstasy...can I come along for the ride? I love when happenstance leads you in a direction you hadn't thought about....go with it...no, run with it....

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  7. This apple is awesome. Great job.

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  8. Anonymous2:44 AM

    Beautiful apple, Diahn! the colours are just so vibrant and your brushwork wonderful...this is really a keeper.
    ronell

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  9. Diahn, I just love this! I didn't know acrylics could look like this. I think that one artist can be very different in different media and styles. Looking back over your recent work I"d say that just about anything you try is bound to work out.

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  10. I love it, too...colors are vibrant, it looks like you had fun painting it, and i love that it's not perfectly centered and completely whole.

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  11. this is awesome! love the colors!

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  12. wow this is some apple,very juicy!!

    you must be very quick to do this in between acrylics drying,unbelievable!

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