Wilmington Art Association Spring Show: Best in Fine Art

I had the great pleasure of receiving the Best in Fine Art award at the Wilmington Art Association Spring show. This is one of the first juried exhibitions I've entered, and it needed some traveling ( the NC coast is farther than you think). A big thank you to everybody who helped me get it out there, especially my lovely friend Abby, who also received the award on my behalf! And also thanks to the Wilmington Art Association who was very accommodating in the handling of the painting and award.

Carlyn. Oil on canvas on board. 20x30 inches

Some Portraits

Luckily, I paint more than I show off. By a good deal. 

Dina. Oil on canvas panel, 11x14

Adrian. Oil on canvas panel, 11x14

Running out of paintings

The Muddy Colors blog is a constant source of inspiration ( and a way to procrastinate while not feeling too bad about myself).  Jesper Ejsing's post is a great reminder that we only have so many paintings left to create in our life time, so we should make them count:

http://muddycolors.blogspot.com/2013/02/everyone-counts.html

As someone interested in the nocturne genre, I always find myself coming back to this post by James Gurney: Is Moonlight Blue?

http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2008/01/is-moonlight-blue.html

It's really interesting to delve into the scientific study of night-time lighting and it's effect on color. Apparently, moonlight has a slight reddish hue; who knew?

Been focusing on a slightly different direction recently, specifically trying to beef up the fantasy/ illustration side of my portfolio. Anybody that knows me well knows that If I'm not painting or eating chickfila, I'm probably playing card games. I would love to do some work for games like Magic: the gathering or Legend of the Five Rings sometime in the future. 

Below is a page of my sketchbook where I did some acryla-gouache thumbnails. Sometimes your first idea is your best, or maybe I just got lazy.

And here is the thumbnail taken into photoshop and renderend to completion:

Portrait of Mary

Mary Howard. 36x48 inches. Oil on canvas.

Time

The following portraits I'm particularly happy with due to the time in which they were completed. While in most cases, work is not judged by the time it took, but the power of the image, the alla prima portrait must consider it, especially when your model has a limited time window.

"Danny". 9x12. oil on linen panel. 45 minutes.

"Amanda". 11x14. oil on canvas. 1 hour 20 minutes.

Haven't updated in a while, will take some time to post all that I made during the last 2 weeks of the quarter. Here's some alla prima self portraits. All 11x14, oil on sized paper.

Self portrait

2-3ish hours. Keep the ball rolling

Self portrait. 8x11. Graphite ( sketchbook entry)

Adriana

This seems to be a step up from my normal level of alla prima paintings( no doubt do in part to the lovely model ;]). It's amazing what you can do with 2 colors + white: winsor and newton burnt sienna ( transparent oxide red) and Ivory black. I believe this one took about 2 hours. Sometimes things just come together, and it's good to thank the painting gods when they do!

Adriana. 8x11. Oil on sized paper ( sketchbook entry)

Master study in gouache

Gouache is a tricky medium; it's amazing the value changes a tile of color can go through after you've applied it. It's easy for things to appear chalky, especially out of context or if you aren't completely controlling the hue, value, and chroma of your colors consistently. Many of my gouache experiments have more of the " ugly" stage than any other mediums I've used.

This is a step towards decency, but I'm still fighting the medium, not actually using it. Currently I'm just treating the painting as oils, glazing in darks with transparent inks, and building up layers of progressively thicker, up to impasto lights.

Master study after Rembrandt. App 8x11". gouache and brown and black in on paper.

Interior Nocturne

hot off the easel. This painting was a great learning process for me, exploring many different ways of applying paint than what I'm used to. I didn't play anything safe with this one; some layers started out by nearly obliterating the ones below. Usually if something is working in a painting I leave it alone in fear of ruining it, but with this painting I took the opportunity to experiment. The dimensions changed from the original canvas, and there was even a time when the laptop was painted out just to see what it did to the composition!

"Interior Nocturne". 30x45". Oil on canvas.

 Detail:

Oh Matthew

You so purdy.

"Matthew". 8x11". Oil on sized paper ( sketchbook entry)

Whoops.

I accidentally stepped on this painting; right on the face too. How it survived I don't know. I feel as I've gotten better at painting I've gotten worse at photographing said paintings...

This study was done with a relatively limited palette: Ultramarine blue, burnt sienna, yellow ochre, and white. The darks are a mixture of the sienna and ultramarine. If you could only by 4 tubes of paint I would suggest these. Take out the yellow ochre if you can only buy 3.

After Vermeer's " Girl With a Pearl Earring". Approximately 8x10. Oil on sized watercolor paper ( sketchbook entry)

It's not painting if you're not using your left hand

This is for a 5 week painting for Color and the painted image. I've chosen to depict an interior nocturne, if you can call it that. I have a lot that I want to do with this image, specifically to do everything differently than I usually do. I've made drawing errors in one layer only to fix them in another and let the ghost of the " wrong" parts show through. Archival application of paint and traditional fat over lean rules will be discarded in favor of the final effect ( although I haven't gone too crazy yet). Most notably however, is so far I've only painted with my left, non dominant hand. It's always been an irrational fear of mine, to lose my right hand, and this painting is allowing me to see what can be done with - very - limited dexterity. I have to attack my canvas any way possible to get the right edges and value shapes, and it makes for a surprisingly beautiful surface. Here was an early state of the image:

And here it is with a glaze of burnt sienna over the entire thing and modeled more completely. I preferred the color scheme of the previous state, but I'm not keeping anything in this image sacred. I've always taken safe routes in painting by not harming anything that is currently working, but here i'm making a point to obliterate it. It's an exciting feeling when you've lost a part of the image that will never be exactly the same and all you can do is search for a better state.

I'm thinking of taking the laptop out completely.

Anatomy studies: Facial muscles

The muscles of the face are one part of the human anatomy I haven't spent much time on. Will be doing more for portrait drawing class. All of the mixed media is making my sketchbook look pretty.

facial anatomy study. 8x11. Ink, watercolor, and gouache on paper.

Giovanni Boldini: The king of Swish

I think Boldini kind of gets overshadowed by Sargent as far as late 19th century painters go, but he was successful during his day and he definitely displayed a bit of expression and motion that even Sargent didn't really go to. In my opinion at least. Here's a study:

Study after Boldini. 8x11. Sketchbook entry ( oil on sized watercolor paper)

A nocturne and a master study

After a night photography shoot, there was one particular picture of horrible quality, but despite it's homely look I knew I could make a decent painting out of it. I used it for a homework exercise for a class: Color and the painted image, where roughly half of the composition was to be exclusively organic pigments and the other, inorganic. Due to the complex nature of a wide array of pigments, thickness, and transparency it goes without saying it looks better in person ( I try not to pull that card too often).

"Hill and Vines". 9x12". Oil on canvas board.

Another assignment, this time for advanced portrait drawing. Sargent has been a major source of inspiration recently, and his Head of a Capri girl is one of select number of paintings that resonate with me deeply.

After Sargent's Head of a Capri Girl. 8x11. Sketchbook entry ( sized watercolor paper)

Prototype MDL 0022%-[M.X.C]

"Prototype MDL 0022%-[M.X.C]"

© Christopher Pariano

Model: Micah Chelen

Subversive Fashion Presentation

The first concepts for the subversive fashion project dealt with pixel art technique and "pixel perfect curves" being displayed on the female form. After showing these, the professor asked " do they glow?"

Theres no reason they can't. To justify a glowing garment I tapped into the resources of my latest pixel inspiration- Gameboy technology. The garment then became a collection of monitors on the human form that received graphical input from Gameboy hardware.

Then the professor said " I think the controls should be headgear"

I could only assume this meant to make the obvious connection between a hardware controller and the cerebral control over the human body- so the concept was pushed to make the garment and the model become more unified, with retro game technology and aesthetic being applied to the figure.

Concept:

By the combination of organic form and the geometric atom of the computer pixel, this fashion piece is half garment, half retro gaming hardware on the human scale. Through body modification ( such as directional pad and A/B button implants and circuit board tattoos) as well as Gameboy hardware, the organic human figure and pixel come together.

Materials:

The garment would be separated into 4 LED maps that would receive graphical input from modified Gameboy hardware. Attachments and accessories are created from respective link cables. The head piece includes a Gameboy Camera, allowing the audience to see themselves as the human/ Gameboy hybrid form would.