Creating and Producing the Art

 

Creating and Producing the Art

The following is a short rendition of how the paintings on this website are produced. I only paint using oils on canvas.

1) I think of a painting in my mind. I presently want to create art with a nude interacting with five to ten levels of abstractions. In a sketchbook, I make a very rough sketch of what I want to create. (See Concept above) The sketch takes less than two or three minutes.

2) Next, I do an image search on the Internet for the things I want in the painting. I am a web designer with an excellent facility with Photoshop and other graphic software. I then create many layers using these images and construct a crude representation of the painting (See Photoshop Sketch above). Mostly I am interested in shape, design and general composition at this stage. For instance, I am interested in the shape of a butterfly, not its design or color.

3) When I finish with step two, I use a large printer to print a black and white copy of the Photoshop sketch in the actual size of the canvas to be created.

4) Next, I tape carbon paper over the canvas, and then tape the printout over that. I mark on the printout with a High-Liter the general areas that I want my apprentice to transfer to the canvas.

5) When the apprentice is finished with her work, I remove the carbon and the printout from the canvas and I begin to add in the details of the painting. I often make a lot of changes and add a lot of detail to the transferred image. In the end, I have what amounts to an elaborate paint-by-numbers, sketched in a hard lead pencil on the canvas.
For an example of a completed drawing click here: Mentor Red Drawing

6) Next, I mix the paint to be applied to the canvas. After mixing the paint, I take a brush or Q-tip and daub the paint onto the areas where I want to apply that color. The apprentice then applies the color. The apprentice does occasionally voice her opinion about the developing painting, and sometimes I incorporate those changes or a modification of those changes. Except in very small areas, paint is not applied on the top of other paint. The canvas is painted the same as a commercial paint-by-numbers, with colors applied side-by-side.

7) When I am creating the sketch of the painting or adding the color, decisions have to be made as the work develops. The things I see in my visualization are not always the way they look when the painting is being actually drawn and painted. During the production, while the apprentice is working, I constantly monitor the developing painting and make changes. Some changes are subtle, but every once in a while the changes are significant. In the twenty-five years that I have been using my current technique, I have never found it necessary to remove paint from a large area and repaint it. I micro manage the development of the painting too closely for that to happen.

8) After the apprentice goes home each day, I usually spend time looking at the painting to make sure it is moving in the right direction and decide if I need to make any changes to get the painting more in line with my vision. I never tire of looking at my art.

9) I only allow the most skilled apprentices to paint the nude figures. Those are generally done after the rest of the painting is finished and has been allowed to dry for about a week. Sometimes, the figure is painted first.

10) See the Final Painting above and the ones below and see how different the final paintings are from the pencil and Photoshop sketches.

Dr John WorldPeace
150730


 
 
 
 
 
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