Thursday, April 15, 2004

Flowered Up, Hacked Off

Well this post was intended for last night. We ended up having to rush Elis to the emergency Doctors last night, as he had a temperature of 103. I've had to miss work today to look after him (at a busy time) and we were up most of the night with him. He was sick everywhere at lunchtime, slept most of the afternoon and woke up blistering hot again. I've had next to no sleep as well and Mrs Dio had to go in to work else she be sacked.

So, yesterday lunch I managed to get out for a lunch break stroll. It was feeling very spring-like yesterday. Something must be in the air because I got of my arse to finally throw some prints onto canvas via Dylon image maker. I've been planning it for a long while and never gotten around to it. I need to make some dosh urgently though, so with the long weekend I thought I had to give it a go.

No idea how it will turn out or if it will sell, I've wanted to experiment like I did in college before it was sucked out of me. Its not my normal painting, but it is as well. And what with commercial implications at the fore, I've decided to use some nice saleable source material. Flowers, to be precise. Yes, you read that right. Flowers.

Blame it on work, I've been working on some Tiffs of classical paintings for an upcoming site called Painting Flowers, tarting up and processing images of flowers from artists over the years. I suppose it must have rubbed off on me. Commercial? Flowers? Call me art tart.

As I'm using actual photographic material in the paintings, I've been out collecting some source material. Loads to see at the moment. Blossom everywhere. Around the one side of Llandaff Cathedral was a good source for the fancy flowers and wreaths as well as having a couple of nicely photographically pleasing Tulip (Blossom?) Trees. I love those trees at this time of year. The flowers are normally very pale pink, however, I spotted a nice flushed strain outside the Cathedral. Here we go...

Already the natural daffodils are looking haggard and on their last legs. I'm starting to think the daffodil is pretty pointless, it gets a few weeks in winter when nothing else is there to compliment it and then dies back to horrid green stalks just as everything else is coming out. Thank god for monuments and fresh cut flowers?

And there be some lovely wild flowers over in the overgrown half of the graveyard.

As well as a large flower canvas I'm working on a pair which are photos of the Cathedral towers. I think if they work out I want to use the gravestones and gargoyles as well. Another one down to time will tell.

The transfer process is fairly straightforward, but on treated canvas it leaves lots of blemishes and mistakes. Fine by me. I like the washed-out distressed look it leaves. I purposefully tore the original inkjet prints as well, for a bit of contrast. I have ideas to maybe try brushstrokes of transfer fluid on an image rather than cover the whole image.

Its quick a quick and easy way of covering the canvas. The rest will be very geometric and rhythmical like the mixed media works I was doing back in 1994. Lots of layers and textures, diffusion, obstruction and formal surface interest will be the order. Inspired more by artists like Robert Rauschenberg or Tom Phillips than me usual figurative favourites.

At least that's the plan.

Posted by Dio Bach at 22:26

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