Back to Blogging

Hey everyone, now that Affinity is up for everyone to see, we will be writing new posts and showing the rest of the work that went into our show. Please stay tuned, we know it has been a while since our last post, but only good things to follow!



http://www.wells.edu/stringroomgallery/exhibitions/scheiffleepurnell/bslp1.htm

Pittsburgh: The Frick Museum

We just got back from Pittsburgh and we saw a show at the Frick. No photography was allowed, but they gave out a free flyer. There were some brilliant drawings by Millet and we got a peek at some of their permanent collection. Brett and I enjoyed the Master of Half-length's triptych (Don't remember the name of it). We also got to ride a segway, also awesome. Not in the museum, though...

Art by Commission

You may have noticed our new link in the right-hand sidebar--

Brett and I are getting ready to start marketing our new project Art by Commission, and staking out a small place on the internet with the AbC blog. Basically this idea is to do some more traditional art-- still life, landscape, and portraits for anyone who commissions us. Each commission will be evaluated on a case by case basis; we will cater as much as possible to a patron's wishes.

There are more printed things to come, but currently we've created this flyer for hanging up in public places.

Painting Fodder

Which might it be? He he...

Lana's current palette

Here is my palette--
Not all the colors on here are wet. The swatches on the edges simply give me a consistent place to put the paint. The globs are wet though. I took this after working on the teacup. As for the order, I focused on temperature more so than value, but next time I will make sure each hue goes in consecutive temperature and value if possible. It seems to jump around a lot.

In order to clean the palette, I simply scrape it down a bit, try to make it smooth, but not necessarily take it back down the the wood. This wood was cheap and the veneer has scraped up. So I am looking forward to my next palette. I will probably change the shape of it a little. I was not using medium of any kind on this day, just paint. The paper towel serves as both a cushion for my thumb when I'm holding it (the palette hole marks up my hand :C) and also a quick cleaner for my brushes. Turpenoid gives me a headache, so I am trying to use it as little as possible.

And I definitely learned, since undergrad, that black is a very important paint to use, contrary to black killing color or being too strong.... Black is OK.

By the way, to create your own palette, visit this useful info--William Whitaker's Palette at Concept art Enjoy!

The 10 o'clock news

This is the news hour with Brett + Lana

As for the progress on the other work....

-The teacup remains a constant adversary to our existing painting processes. This really turned into one of those paintings which seeks to challenge its maker and test whatever he or she is made from. Of course we have news for IT and IT will look great despite the challenges IT gives. None of it is all that interesting to blog about....just wait to see the photographed stages this thing has undergone.

-The Morinaga milk caramel box is virtually finished, we are just waiting for the 2nd coat of background color to dry before putting on the finishing touches. It looks very nice..photos coming ASAP.

-The dot candy, which measures a whopping 8ft by 2ft, is all completely blocked in and just today the second layer of background color has been applied and fanned out. It is important to complete that stage of the painting first for this one, as transparent shadows will have to be glazed over top of the background. Despite its size, it is a fairly simple piece to make and should be free of complication.

-The bon-bon has been varnished and is hanging in the cottage :)

-Now we take you outside to get the weather report from the ducks and bunnies. WOW its an amazing sunset, just look at those clouds, any painter can surely be reminded of the work of Joesph Mallord William Turner and Fredrick Church.

Diffusing the light

Windows are great, an excellent source of light and scenery; however, sometimes they can be a distraction (and a source of freezing air). The sun winds its course throughout the day and as it does the sun moves and often creates annoying glare or blinding light, which makes it tough to paint through, also when it is windy and cold windows let in cold air. Besides when its this time of the year in upstate NY, anything that makes you seem warmer and safer is good. So in order to solve this problem you can go to Home Depot and pick up some inch long screws and lengths of 1.5 inch thick pine strips (get enough to make it around the perimeter of your window), a package of drop cloth with one fabric side and one plastic side, also pick up some smaller strips of wood to divide the final shape with. Cut the pieces to fit the inner most dimensions of your window on a chop saw and screw them together, remember , you will have to overlap them. Cut the smaller strips to fit inside the screen frame and position it however you will and screw it tight. Make sure the frame fits, then stretch the drop cloth (plastic toward the glass) like you would stretch a canvas to a frame using a staple gun. Trim the edges and enjoy!
P.S. Coming soon, the finished morinaga milk caramel image!

Where we work & how to keep it clean

This is the studio. Our new 8 ft long painting is on the wall! Dots!

It's very time consuming to keep it as clean as it is right now. But I'm not complaining; it's totally worth the effort. The space is great, very easy to move studio furniture around as needed. But too bad the walls aren't one solid stud-- the cleats have limited placement.

Keeping it clean requires daily vacuuming, and a wet mop/wipe down at least every other day. As little as there is in here, a lot of dust gets generated. Brett and I are looking into Pro-Wear (as seen in 'Idiocracy') as an alternative to cotton fabrics, as most dust seems to be generated by us. Thankfully, the dust doesn't stick to the floor. All surfaces get dust collected on them.... but keeping the clean studio keeps tension low and is very gratifying.

When I have to clean the white drafting table (seen in the left area of the pic), I almost always have to scrape up old dust buildup (which can occur after 2 days), gunky drying mediums of various kinds, and oil paint. It's pretty easy to do--- just use a little effort and rub (read: scrub thoroughly) the table down with turp natural and scrape with a razorblade, being careful not to nick the table. Then soap and water and dry. If you don't take off the turp natural, the table will get sticky within a few hours and lots of dust will stick.

See you again tomorrow!

Reflections

I spent the past few days taking on the most difficult task yet! The saucer of this teacup has many ripples, evenly spaced, which slope down to the center where the cup sits. Along its edge, the saucer also bends in and out in accordance with the height of the ripples. The material is very shiny and very smooth, therefore, it changes whenever the light does. Even more fun is the fact that the cup sitting over the shiny saucer gets oddly reflected into the surface and bent around every ripple. Put all of this into an elliptical perspective and onto a 3' x 4ft' panel and you have before you one daunting task, with only one way to approach it....DIVE IN!

Grabbing 10 paint brushes and a huge grisaille pallet I went to work making everything happen with the paint and no under-drawing. I was really afraid of having uneven values which makes the painting the look doughy and ugly. Using big brushes and keeping my eye on the pallet helped to keep things going smoothly. A simple --but crucial-- rule for reflections is that no matter how confusing they may look, they are simply an image being projected onto an underlying surface. This was particularly tough here because the underlying surface was so forshortened. Getting through it required slowing down, and following the course of every ripple. During this project I began to see just how chaotic these relatively mechanical images become.

Fun size

Welcome to Brett and Lana's blog. We each graduated from Rochester Institute of Technology last May, 2008 with BFAs in illustration and minors in art history.

Fun Size is our collaborative new series of work with a postmodern neo-pop spin. The blog serves as a record of our collaboration, which began in November 2008.