Detail of Drum Circle
18x24 inches acrylic on canvas
This
week's blog is about my recently finished painting, Drum Circle.
It's fairly large-ish for me, 18 x 24 inches and my intent was to
show a scene with different folks interacting with each other. I also
wanted to play with the full value spectrum of light and dark.
Another
artistic aspect I wanted to play with was design and composition. By
the time I'd firmed up the painting's composition I was working with
a triangle, formed by the left hand figure's leg pointing up to the
background building's yellow high light and coming down to the
toddler's tippy toed feet. I also had a secondary visual “pathway”
or circle of interest....hints of pure red in the drum leader's
tie-dyed t-shirt, the hat with the Drum Circle sign, the toddler's
drum and his drum stick, and the cup of cola in the nurse's hand.
Both these visual devices or details are to guide the viewer's eye
around in the painting.
I also
had a ball doing subtle brush work details, like the side turn of the
nurse's head with just a bit-o-glint on the sunglasses, her nose and
lower lip.
I was
also pleased with the free handed brushwork of the nurse's hand
holding the white cola cup centered on her co-worker's white shirt.
By varying the color and temperature of the different whites, I was
able to show them all together yet differentiate between the
different white objects.
Along
with the detail of the toddler intent on beating his red drum at the
top of the post, I had a blast doing different LOD or level of
details on different sections of this painting. These different bits
of detailing within a complex painting were a classic example of both
“the devil is in the details” and the delight to be found in
detailing a painting just enough to tell it's story with out over
doing the level of detail.
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