Saturday, November 28, 2009

"Black and White and Read All Over"

Dowager Brooch, 12" x 8.5" oil on wood

Brooch of Bewitchment, 14" x 12", oil on wood

Buffalo Heart, 14" x 12", oil on wood

I can't tell if I'm legitimately self-doubting or just in a grumpy mood, but the boa frame annoys me. I feel I've sacrificed a painting (an experience) to make an art object (a symbol for experience). I also have mixed feelings about exploring the point where a painting functions as an object. It seems interesting. All human pondering is interesting, and formal considerations are ultimately about human pondering. I just think this particular issue, the workings of a painting functioning outside of the 2-d realm, may be of relatively minor interest, compared to the workings of a painting within the 2-d realm.

These are for the upcoming color-themed show at the Harrison Center (16th and Delaware St, Indianapolis). Opens on Dec. 4.

4 comments:

Nomi Lubin said...

The bottom one I find especially successful. It's exciting.

Carla said...

Thanks, Nomi. I'm starting to see ways, thematic ways, that I can organise different types of work, and have it all.

I want to explore figuration (as in shape creation and composition) in a big, broad, stumbling way. But I also want to really work with the tiny refinements of an establish figure.

The figuration in this last piece is very simple in composition and in paint application technique. That part is 'spawned' from the larger paintings I'd been doing, where I struggle more, trying to figure things out. But I plan on doing more such paintings, where I'm playing with variations on a pre-determined basic composition.

I will likely change the title of my April show from "Minor Deities" to "Spawn". I like the idea of showing two such differing ways of working and thinking, all presented within the same theme.

Elizabeth Goodspeed said...

I'm really digging the second one. It was a very biological feel. The white space is an interesting choice as well.

Carla said...

Thanks, Elizabeth.

I just re-read my own comment. It made so much sense at the time, and now I don't even know what I meant.