Here I’m publishing the 1st stage – an original monotype – and the finished overlaid painting. Looking at the two images now I can see what choices I would make differently. The energy of the 1st state has been redirected distinctly.
I’m working on some monotypes dedicated to Jeremy Lin, the phenom of the NY Knicks. I hope to post the results later.
Tom Bennett
Nod to Basch, 1st stage, monotype, 18″ x 28″
Nod to Basch, oil over monotype on paper, 18″ x 28″
Hey guess what. Yes. I made yet more postcards this week. Here are a few of them.
Well, take care of yourselves. No one else is going to do it for you.
Loveandabominablehope,
-Steph
Unless you’ve been having a pedicure under a rock the last few days, you’ll know the football NY Giants beat the NE Patriots to win the superbowl for the 2nd time in 4 years. Without going into an analysis of the season and the game itself and bore most of you, I’ll just say, as a New Yorker, this team is cardiac-arrest-fun with its habit of coming back from the dead and pulling out a win at the last minute.
Mario Manningham came up with, arguably perhaps, the game-changing catch along the sideline. The play was expressionist in its execution.
Tom Bennett
Uploaded with [URL=http://imageshack.us]ImageShack.us[/URL]
Manningham, monotype, 20′ x 16″
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Still very much work, still very much in progress.
These will not be paired with “Ends.”
-JD
about 20 x 30 inches
oil and pastel on gessoed paper
More old work from long, long ago or about the same time as these.
about 30 x 20 inches
oil, nails and eggshells on gessoed paper
I’m still never quite sure where to put anything. And so, it just keeps piling up.
From a long way under,
-Steph
More paintings made from monotypes. These two pieces I finished a couple of days ago and I’m of two minds about them. The first, In the Corner, may be a tad too defined in the figure. I’m not sure I’m pushing the abstraction enough. The second painting I’m on the fence about as well. How’s that for mixed metaphor cliches?
Tom Bennett
In the Corner, oil over monotype on paper, 28″ x 20″
The Fat and the Thin, oil over monotype on paper, 20″ x 16″
Last night instead of preparing art for today I ironed shirts. I have no regrets, but I also have nothing to post. I don’t know if I’ve ever posted this before.
“Woven Watercolor Cross” 2005 It’s like 30″ wide or something. Watercolor soaked through canvas, woven.
This is a woven piece made out of a dropcloth that I used a lot of watercolor on. I then flipped the dropcloth, where you could see where the watercolor soaked through. Toni hates me for this because it’s so light sensitive I won’t allow it out of my closet.
-JD
Two more explorations in the current series. The one called Lauren’s Underbelly got its title from the happy little fact that the underpainting/monotype was a portrait of a pregnant woman. She apparently gave birth to this painting. It’s a girl!
Hidden Defect, oil into monotype on paper, 22′ x 16″
Lauren’s Underbelly, oil into monotype on paper, 18″ x 12″
This piece has a photographic feel and Kodak is on its death bed. That’s a sad thought.
Ektachromoplasm, oil over monotype on paper, 20″ x 16″
It’s been a long time since I have taken any photographs of people, and when I do they are usually people I know very well, but a recent interaction made me wonder what the fair use of pictures of strangers would be. I don’t take pictures for advertisements, or to sell, so it’s not something I ever really think much about but since the question came up I threw it out to my good friends on Twitter and Matthew Best was kind enough to provide me with this very useful article which answered all of my questions and then some. Looks like as long as I am in public and not invading a private space then I am in the clear.
In the mean time you should check out some of his work here. Good stuff.
First things: I’ve started a Tumblr to post some of the pieces I make that will go into future quilts, and other progress shots.
This is a test of work I’ve been doing with stencils. I can use individual letter stencils to then create words and more.
Towards that end, here are 1000 Es that I created.
More after the jump. Read more »
I’ve been in Baltimore caring for my parents for a week and have been painting in the basement of the house I’m staying in. Here are some of the results.
I had the opportunity to take advantage of my father Harry’s experienced eye for design. He’s 92 years old. I asked him what he thought of the 1st piece below while I was still working through unresolved stages. He looked at it, covered an area with his hand and said, “get rid of this shape. These things don’t mean anything.” A title was born.
Tom Bennett
These Things Don’t Mean Anything, oil on monotpye, paper, 18″ x9″
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Below, I’ve posted a photo of an original monotype and the subsequent over-painting.
First stage: Original monotype on paper
figure 1993, monotype,
Final stage:
Figure 1-11-12, oil on paper, 2012,
Photos of the first stages of the process I’m exploring with these current reworked monotypes-to-paintings.
The monotype is an ancient relic from the early 90′s. Drawing over the image and reintegrating the underlying forms with the new marks, I then bring in paint of varying viscosities with brush and knife. The recontextualization of form may be overtly reconsidered or more likely metamorphosizes ‘organically’ (for lack of better pompous phrasing). Here much of the original is obliterated yet structurally the new image is recognizably built on form that is now rendered abstract. I’m away from my studio this week and won’t be reworking this until I get back, so this current unresolved stage will have to ferment like a soft wheel of gouda, also known as my head.
Here’s a bit of progress on this one. Remember what it looked like before? Well, here it is now. It’s not a big change, but what with the holidays and feeling as if I’d rather hide in a dungeon than open my eyes most days lately, I figure any progress is good.
Hope you’re all enjoying your days more than a sharp stick in the eye and fingers crossed for a positive start to this next year!
Love and MOREFRACKINGDAYLIGHTPLEASE!
-Steph
My apologies for the mediocre photo, I left my equipment in Baltimore over the Christmas holiday and was forced to use my iPhone.
Happy New Year. If you get wasted, hope its a good time.
Tom Bennett
Injected Meaning, monotype reintroduced with oil paint, on Rives BFK paper, 24″ x 18″
When taking monotypes and working back into them with other media, I intend to allow the under-print to be an integral part of the process and have a dialogue with the fresh mark making. With this piece I fear I have pushed to far with the paint and the literal form. The most overt area revealing the print is the space on the right with amorphous cell-like blobs. That said, I like the spotty abstracted relationships and may accept this as sort of a red-headed step child, even though she’s a brunette.
Tom Bennett
Nice and Easy, oil on monotype, rives bfk paper, 20″ x 16″
I’ve had this piece sitting around, waiting for paint for months. This week, I started painting on it. There will be much, much more paint before it’s finished. It will likely end up with little resemblance to what you see here. But I thought it might be fun to share progress shots of this one along the way. You can see a photo of it at an earlier stage after the jump.
A monotype currently being revisited. Something about this makes me think of, remember fondly, my experiences in Turkey. I can’t tell you why.
WIP: Konja, 2003-2011, oil paint over oil based monotype on paper, 24″ x 18″
This is a quick sketch I made in photoshop at the end of last night. It fills in a geometrical perspective drawing I made with collaged paintings.
The collaged painting I used is here, which includes some paintings that Steph sent me to cut up for her.
Here’s a few others:
Read more »
oil, spraypaint, and enamel on gessoed paper
about 30 x 20 inches
1994
For a while now, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about some art I made a long time ago. It’s been moldering in a portfolio (some of it folded in half) in a corner of my studio for years. Lately, art making has me feeling antsy, as it does sometimes, and my mind is searching for ways around it. What I used to do when I hit a stage like this was gesso a bunch of papers, tape them to the wall or the floor and just fucking work without giving a fuck, make a mess, play with whatever was around until I’d worked out whatever was itching up my britches.
Well today, I dug out a handful of the rumpled old works that were on my mind. Above and below are two from the vault circa 1994. It’s fun to look back at this stuff. There are things I still like about them and things I’d do differently now, but I’m thinking the approach is something I need to revisit. Specifically, I want to be careless and make a mess. No, I want to make a bunch of really big messes and see what comes of it. Wish me luck. No… wish me fun.
oil, spraypaint, and charcoal on gessoed paper
about 30 x 20 inches
1994
Thanks for accompanying me on this little time warp.
-Steph
Sweetjeezlouise, I tried not to post this song, but really, how could i not? Sorry.
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