The Blood of Winter Underpainting, Laropal Wood Stain Ideas

Three steady days. Added gold leaf to the H Beam Piper painting on Thursday. Yesterday and today underpainted 'The Blood of Winter':

Last night, after the step above, went to the Hopes and Beams poetry and short story open mic. This event is unusual in that about half of the readings are stories rather than poems; last night more than half. Awoke a little dopey, but completed the Blood underpainting this morning.

Detailed though this is (the skull eyes are perhaps 10x10mm), I'll probably glaze everything. Also today, the H Beam Piper novel has arrived, which I may use on the painting. Text can distract the viewer, so I need to consider this carefully.

I've ordered £90 of oil paint, but annoyingly have a rogues-gallery of colours I've bought to test but won't use. I'm thinking that these may be useful for making wood stain. I think a mix of oil paint, alcohol, and Laropal A81 will be a good formula for wood stain. It seems that only a tiny amount of Laropal is needed to form a glossy layer, most of the cost is the alcohol. Today I'll perform the density calculations so that I can produce some test recipes in tiny amounts.

Miners Of Economic Worries Forging A Path Through H Beam Piper

A night of fantastic dreams. In one, I had the ashes of Deborah's father, Ernest, who was a painter (among other things, but I think it was in this context that he was in my dream). These were in a cylinder, like a pencil perhaps, though a little wider (a magic wand?). I had to launch them into space, into low Earth orbit for some special action, exposure to certain rays. I recall trying to work out how to do this. A second dream involved a huge building of silver and glass in the sky, like a futuristic library with echoes of Birmingham Library. I managed to fly up to it, and in through the closed window (in my spectral dream state). It was busy with business people or administrators. At one point an ensemble practiced Beethoven's 9th Symphony and I, working nearby (or pretending to, knowing that I was imposter), sang a key note which was rather loud and slightly flat, to the amusement of those rehearsing.

Today, a full day of work on the new painting: 'Miners Of Economic Worries Forging A Path Through H Beam Piper'. I've decided on a somewhat large format of 337x437mm, the face larger than life size. I'd thought of 335x435, and by chance found an MDF panel of 357mm wide, so ideal for this. I started the day by sawing the panel, then drew out the portrait and general plan.

In the afternoon I sealed and primed the panel with ridiculously expensive Lascaux Primer, but it only needed about 3 teaspoons of paint for two coats. By this evening, this complex composition was finished, although I've not checked the likeness of my hand-drawn outlines. Perhaps this matters less. Like hitting a note in a song, this isn't the most important factor; the correct expressiveness is what matters. I have to modify the facial expression to one of worry anyway.

It's somewhat, in style and genus, like my Charlie Chaplin painting, or 'Escape', the Nazimova one, or others like it ('Five Thousand Years Of Tears'); a modification of an extant image in a sort of hand-painted collage. I'm considering underpainting it in greys, it would make the process easier as the source photo is grey. It'll probably take 4 hours to trace over the drawing.

Empty House Underpainting Complete, H Beam Piper

Completed the underpainting to the Empty House painting, then went to grab a few art supplies from Alexander Paper Supplies. Developed an idea about H Beam Piper, which I may enter the Three Counties Open with (portraits are always good for competitions), but I'd need to rush, there is only 5 or 6 weeks until the end of the deadline. With oils, drying time between layers is a big factor. I want to paint it on a smooth panel, inspired by medieval and Renaissance (Northern and Italian) portraits; plus it needs text from one of his books, so I've ordered the cheapest I could find on eBay (the more tatty the better, I want it to look and be old). It was Gunpowder God - perfect for this idea. It will include gold leaf too.

I've also ordered more pieces for the router jig, will build this soon.

Tomorrow, drawing out this portrait idea. On we charge.

Empty House Underpainting Day 1

A good day underpainting 'The Howl Quakes The Empty House'.

A Joyous Refuge Glazing

A huge and joyous contrast of painting experience to yesterday! Awake since about 1am and hardly any sleep, yet the first hour of glazing was almost miraculous, I loved the experience and felt in complete command of the colours and process. How these strange contrasts emerge. I must remember that the glaze should, or at least can happily, appear too intense; but that at the end, that intensity will seem to magically fade away once the entire surface is glazed. Also, that the colour and a compliment (not necessarily an exact compliment, any other hue) should be around to dart between the two at whim, including the raw tube colours.

Occasional highlights in an opposite hue are the key to local drama. I listened to Jean-Michel Jarre's 'Rarities' from his album Essentials & Rarities and noticed a link between these shocks of colour and minor-chord dramatic hits with filter-sweeping sounds.

Here is my updated double-dipper, complete with watch-glass. Already a useful item:

In the night I designed a new jig for my router. I had designed one with two tracks of wood on which the router can slide, but in the night thought it was more efficient to keep the router stationary and slide the wood. This will need lots of little wheels, like drawer wheels, to guide the wood and help it slide, plus some springs to gently hold one train of wheels against the wood (the other is locked into the correct place). The whole thing will only be about 250x500mm, and could support other tools (jigsaw?) for other work on these long lengths.

I'm in the mood to do a lot and make a lot. I'd like to publish all of my remaining old games later in the year, and complete the sheet music to the last three vocal albums, then I can start to work on the electronic instrumental albums.

For now, I can celebrate the signing and end of 'Can There Be A Refuge From The Terror?'. Some of yesterday's elements, the sky, the central eye, were brightened up today, to good effect. It's now certainly better than when merely underpainted.

Nantwich Open Exhibition, Glazing Can There Be A Refuge Day 1

A tedious and joyless day glazing 'Can There Be A Refuge From The Terror?'. I find it hard to get motivated to glaze. It always improves a painting in smoothness and appearance, brightness of colours, and the tiny details, but it's more like polishing than creating, and there's often little joy of discovery. It can take many hours to make only a few percent of improvement. I was also a little tired after a nice day and evening at the opening event for the Nantwich Open. I'm honoured that 'The Unexpected Return Of Oliver Cromwell In 2020' has been given a prime hanging spot in the middle of a wall.

Yes, I wore my cavalier hat. Of all places and occasions, at Nantwich Museum to see my Oliver Cromwell portrait seems to be the best for a cavalier hat.

Anyway today began with one innovation. I sawed off one dipper of the metal double-dipper I used for solvent. I only ever use one anyway, so thought that in the space of the other I could fit a holder for the 55mm watch-glass I use for oil media. I'll fix this later.

Most of today was glazing the green sky, tiny amounts in viridian, raw umber, transparent yellow ochre; and a delicate blue glow around the angel. Painting the cat and distant eye-sun. Painting the small copper butterfly, and some flesh glazes on the angel, although I'll generally leave her be, as she is smooth enough. All of this still took all day, perhaps at the same speed as the underpainting. The painting is rather dull in colour terms, actually less bright than the underpainting as the amber eye-sun was a little too bright, so I dulled it a little. I may brighten up the sandy parts tomorrow.

The Blood Of Winter Starts

A general health check yesterday, passed with a slight deterioration which I must aspire to reverse. After that, composition work and main drawing for a painting idea called The Blood Of Winter. Here is the idea sketch:

These ideas are often more of a mnemonic, but here (because it was made so long ago I can't remember the spark of concept) a seed of a feeling. It needed more poetry and linkage. If surrealism is adding 'any old thing', this is not sufficient, it needs links of expectation rewarded or thwarted; a comprehensible structure of its own. Objects build on their relations to each other.

The painting was drawn out at 448mm across and today I'll work on the colours and surfaces. Last night I dreamt of a painting, an image and a title. I think the title was 'The Science of Sleep'. It was a hollow black isosceles triangle with one section on fire, burning into blue sky. The background had no colour. I'll paint this too.

Claire Luce Returns

A night of nightmares about my future and anxious insomnia.

A day of painting; the second Claire Luce portrait, underpainted last year more successfully than the other version, yet still today was a struggle and I remain dissatisfied with the results. These paintings are tests, training, for good reason.

The finish is smooth, the colours adequate, although the hair stands out, not natural, this is partly due to the black and white source image where the hair can be hard to locate - a monochrome copy would solve this. The result perhaps looks like a colourised photograph for this reason. The likeness is not good, though on par with, perhaps a little better than, the accuracy of several other similar portraits of the past; annoying, but not a certain step backwards. The colouration is on par with previous works too, perhaps better than average. These works are always difficult, and are thus rewarding as training. The poor quality of the blurry and black and white source image is a key problem, I have less trouble with good source images, several are better and it's best to know the sitter - one can't determine a likeness from one photograph. I strive to add detail and crisp outlines where there are none, so perhaps an exact likeness is impossible in such circumstances. I could easily copy the blur, though this may defeat the object of the exercise.

There are some steps I can take to improve the accuracy. The face shape itself must be the first consideration; the face here is slightly long. The eyes are slightly out of place, but all is relatively close. Contrast could be improved perhaps. The hair is lacking in many details, I don't care so much, this today was a secondary concern.

I will work on it more perhaps.