Painting ~ Process

My current paintings focus on a story about insectophile humanoids and the much larger insects who inhabit a terrain of mangroves, agaves and ficus trees connected by a fungal network. The forest floor is littered with leaves and bark shavings and the many shaped gourds are hewn and re-purposed as dwellings.

Adapting traditional techniques to storytelling

I was motivated to paint as a result of my Ascot and Aspen furniture collection which began in the 1990’s.

The collections featured a tallboy and buffet offered as limited editions that I closed at # 78/100 and 21/30 respectively. In both collections the wood choice, grain pattern and color were critical backdrops for the scenes I painted and to ensure consistency I would buy my veneer in bundles and occasionally as logs. English brown oak is attacked by a fungus which turns the pale wood a rich golden brown with striking chocolate markings and was the perfect canvas for the Tallboy’s autumnal red, yellow vines that were painted over gold leaf. The simpler straight grain of American plain sliced walnut was well suited as the background for buffet’s gray and black Aspen trees, painted over silver leaf. With both pieces the gilded surface created an iridescence that could be seen through the upper layers of translucent pigmented glazes. The outline of the tree or vine was drawn onto the surface of the sealed wood and successive layers of white casein were applied to fill the grain with a raised flat surface. The casein once sealed was gilded with silver or gold applied over gold size. Successive layers of translucent UTC colored glazes were applied, and darker shadows were added by dry brushing solid colors around the tree and leaf edges. To add realism dark glazes were water spotted over the painted scene. These techniques are adaptations of the Japanning and Chinoiserie techniques I was mildly aware of when apprenticed as a wood carver to an antique reproduction company in Worcester, England.

In 2000 a bombe toy chest commission allowed me to hone my japanning skills to tell a story of parading racoons, stags, owls and other critters on a journey through a landscape of trees carved in relief on cherry wood. This piece perhaps more than any other allowed me free range to use my skills as wood carver, sculptor, and novice painter but more importantly to focus on these mediums for telling a new story about insects and humans.

Because I can carve quickly it is difficult for me to refrain from doing so, even when this would make selling art a lot easier. In my 2010 painting “Flying” the frame is part of the concept and if you look closely, you will see 2 carved scarabs buried amongst the vine leaves. Similarly, in “Doctor” the frame extends from the mangrove dwelling and the scene is encapsulated in an organic frieze of carved cherry. Presently I am debating the best way to re-frame these works so that they can be purchased as Giclee prints in simpler but aesthetically pleasing frames. This is a work in progress and no doubt the direction will become clearer as the story line evolves.