Black Cylinder, egg tempera on calfskin parchment, 5 3/4 x 5 3/4 in.
I'm not sure about this painting: I don't dislike it, but I don't love it; it's somewhere in between. I think the problem is that the large blue plane doesn't have enough visual weight. I deliberately painted it to sit alongside the lighter blue triangles, but maybe that is a mistake. I'm wondering: if I paint a thin darker blue line along the lower edge to indicate some depth, do you think it would work better? I'm thinking it might.
I worked very concentratedly on the cylinder, which holds the painting in place; I like that little flaring lip at bottom, which gives the form a bit of quirky personality. I used some color variations in the blue, for physical presence and liveliness, continuing a thought I had with my previous painting, Black and White, where I wrote about layering color. In this painting I did just that: I loosely brushed some ocher and different blues as an underpainting for the blue, and some reds and yellows as underpainting for the cylinder. Because egg tempera is a translucent paint, initial layers can have an effect on the ones above. This is one of the great qualities of this medium (though at times I would prefer the simplicity of opacity), and its source of luminous color.
Altoon. Don't do anything to this painting for a while. In a couple of week try some alterations in photoshop then you'll know.
ReplyDeleteMyrna
Myrna, I've played around in photoshop already, and think I can see what to try. If it doesn't work, I can always change it back. I don't think I'll wait a couple of weeks though....
DeleteActually Altoon, I think that the interaction of the two smaller triangles of pale blue with the larger blue area causes it, the dark blue, to dominate the painting. It is hard to take my eye back to the right side with its vertical elements.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the input, Patricia. I'm going to play around with this painting, see if I can improve it.
DeleteAltoon, one of the things I like about this painting is that there is ambiguity in that relationship of the blue zones. It's possible for the darker blue to come forward, but also for it to fall back. I like that kind of thing, but maybe that's not what you're after. I like the contact between the blues without a line there. That's my opinion, fwiw!
ReplyDeleteRavenna, I'd originally wanted that ambiguity, but now I'm not so sure. I'm going to try putting an edge on the dark blue shape and see what happens. Right now I think the mass of the cylinder is too strong for the rest of the painting. When I look, for instance, at "Grays", I see a similar flat shape, but there isn't a big volumetric form to throw it off.
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