01/08/19
Save mode now!
04/08/19
Clean Palette.
08/08/19
Spider skin
10/08/19
Studio…
Detail of “Bogland Sackrace” - work in progress.
Drawing is essential in practice. It’s not even the success of the outcome that’s important but the act of looking and really scrutinising an image or object. Trying to find a way in.
PERFECTION IS AN ILLUSION.
13/08/19
Wrapping process.
15/08/19
Sketchbook work.
16/08/19
For tomorrow, let loose!
I’ve been lingering long enough on small little intricacies.
It’s not the first time I’ve struggled with a figure in profile.
Need to just look!
‘Art of Spain’ documentary : Goya was deaf!?
Black paintings were done “to the brink of incoherence” (AGD).
17/08/19
‘Bogland’ completed
A really good day in the studio. Huge improvement to ‘Sackrace’. The face in the central figure could be better but that is where I’ll leave it. Back is signed so it’s official.
Studio shot: 17/08/19
Unplanned progress on ‘Ferryman’. More painterly background.
21/08/19
Getting there with the small chores.
22/08/19
24/08/19
Early stages of “The Brown Bull of Cooley”
Started a new large canvas. Took on the image of a woman in motion - her stance suggested a figure that could be in battle. After a little research I decided to add a typical Celtic sword and shield combo. So this found magazine image turns into Queen Medb of Connaught.
Once the figure was on the canvas I was unsure whether to incorporate the bull (Medb’s infamous cattle raid of Cooley as inspiration) but curiosity got the better of me and I tore on with it.
Basically blocking the image up but it is promising so far. It will be interesting to see the fight between Medb and the bull in terms of who will come out dominant where in the composition.
28/08/19
29/08/19
Material delivery!
31/08/19
Studio work and ‘Ferryman’ has stagnated. Some parts work and others flop.
At that strange limbo point where a painting you’re working on fights back and refuses to yield. When one point of grievance is adjusted, two more pop up.
Today - more so than others - has been spent reflecting on lost loved ones and parts of that has made its way onto canvas. Little nods to moments once shared with someone no longer here.
I haven’t had this level of personal attachment to a work in progress in a long time and it has made the already frustrating back and forth of a painting’s final stretch all the more agonising.
Can you paint over a memory or is knowing that these little nods once existed enough?
