Dualities and some more meandering

Deep in the forest

A few posts ago I mentioned I had an assignment to create a diptych (technically these are 2 paintings or panels that work together) of dualites. Most times these are a continuation of a theme or a story and relate to each other, however our teacher decided that he wanted two images were opposites of each other but had some kind of link, Some examples would be life, death, young, old etcetera. It took me a long time to come up with a concept for these mostly because I didnt really want to do opposites, I wanted to do something along the lines of the panels you see in the iconic russian art, that what came to mind when I thought of drawings that are panels of linked image or some of the beautiful Japanese art prints. Needless to say I dawdled and dawlded cause everything seemed to be either to cliche, blah or not fit the assignment criteria.

Finally out of desperation I ended up settling on doing landscapes that were opposite in location, feeling and technique. Deep in the forest was mostly done in photoshop this time I did it after I did the LightHouse at sea. I love how this one came out with the dark moody feeling of the deep dark forest it makes me wonder what is lurking out there in the woods.

Lighthouse on the Ocean

The light house painting was done entirely in Painter and to be honest is not a finished as it should be I spent so many hours on those darn clouds and I am still not happy with them, by the time I got to the light house I was fed up and wanted to be done so I rushed through and did a very loose painting of the light house and rocks.

What I discovered from this is Painter is hard! I can move so fast in photoshop and painter takes me so much longer, I am sure this is still lack of familiarity of how to get the tools and brushes to give me the results I want, I have seen some beautiful work done using painter but I am a long way off from what I would call competent. The second thing I discovered it so sucks to paint things you arent interested in. I really didnt want to paint a lighthouse lol so that probably made it so much harder. I think its important to try to do things out of your comfort zone to help you grow and develop as an artist (but its probably better not to on a deadline for your final projects).

Both paintings are 11 by 17 300 dpi- Kinkos does a great job printing on color stock by the way if anyone needs a place they also do calenders and all kinds of fun things you can print your own art work and photos on.

I have been able to get som gowns done but not in all their colors I tried to get them out for Christmas but that just want happening this time, hopefully Ill get them out this weekend.