Things To Write Down / Things to Look At

"Ability presupposes a capacity for vital experience.  To an artist the most mundane and the most uncommon things can be an experience - a harmony of colours, an interweaving of lines"
~MAX ERNST  (<3 br="br" nbsp="nbsp">

"Encounter Between Two Foreign Thoughts" - Jonas Pettersson

"Transforming a Thought to Red" - Jonas Pettersson

 

 

 

"Sounds of a Blue Voice" - Jonas Pettersson

JONAS PETTERSSON MAKES ME WANT TO WATERCOLOUR RIGHT NOW

 

Watercolourin'

THE NEW STUFF

Some new things I've been working on.  Also check it out - my studio is all moved into now and art is getting ALL UP IN THERE.  Feeling like its my own space.  I have my books and my comfy chair and a shitty boombox and a plant even!  I could basically live there. 

Some unfinished new things.  I decided I love rainbows - and circles.....and rainbow circles

I will be working on this till the end of my days

I am totally cool with that

Yup

RAINBOWS!

Old Drafty

batman's back!

crusty jars of oil and a tv dinner table.  Art and Sophistication.

fresh palette, mmmmmm

little critters

painting on CIRCLES

. 

STUDIOSTUDIOSTUDIOSTUDIOSTUDIOSTUDIO

So...... guess what I just did today.

http://toronto.en.craigslist.ca/tor/ats/3146647123.html

soon to be looking out this window all the time

All of my feelings in images!

I am really bad at updating you blog.

Here - look at these art Gifs!
Seriously!

everything yes

 

Current Inspirations: 

Megan Diddle

Yamada Kumiko (I lost the link! Noooooo)

Sexy Watercolours

Plants

Japanese ink brushes

Tiny Tiny Leaves

Paper-y Poppy Petals everywhere I go.  

Cobalt Teal Blue and Iron Oxide 

Confined Maximalism

Water tension lines.

Concentric Circles 

 This Song: 

Actually Scratch that.  The Whole Album

"Yesterday was Dramatic, Today is OK"

Its true. 

Sketchin'

Look what I found.  Thank-you blogger for saving my drafts!  Old life drawings from my living-room and beyond. 

gestures!

watercolour pencil crayons are the best

crotchlight

this one is my favourite

booty

New to do list:
- sketchbook / life drawing section for website?  YES YES YALL
- Get new watercolours? (ARTIST GRADE YO)
- New BIG Watercolours?! (Obviously)
-MOAR PAINTING!??!?! (Sure why not)

Everything Beautiful is Flawed

GERHARD RICHTER

JOACHIM BANDAU

NATHAN FORD

Abraham Storer - where have you been all my life?

Picked up some old copies of "New American Paintings" at the Antique Market and happened across this guy, Abraham Storer. His artist statement was so similar to what I was trying to do in thesis it was almost ridiculous.  Of course, I was going through one of my old sketchbooks looking for some scrap paper and there's a little note in there to look him up.  and I didn't? Until now?  How did this happen?  Someone suggested that I look this guy up and I totally didn't.  Sometimes I am the WORST.   

Either way see for yourself - the pictures get me every-time.  This man knows his way around a composition - negative space everywhere - everything is a void or a reflection or a lit tent in the dark unknown - just a mass of paint - like a monolith in front of you.  So very very good. 

Yet, at the same time I feel like if I actually looked him up when someone first told me to - I wouldn't have been nearly as into it.  I think I needed to push some paint around first.  

Anyways, Abe, if you're reading this, I think we are art twins.  Even our websites are the same!  You wanna maybe hang out? We can talk about painting and the symbolic significance of the landscape, squighy brushes, the best oil paint brand, our favourite trees, maybe go camping or something.  It will be great. 

I promise.

~K

Artspirational Quotations

Unsolicited Art Advice: 

Learn through action; it doesn't matter what you think - only what you make. 

"Materials are like elementary particles: charged but indifferent. They do not listen in on your fantasies, do not get up and move in response to your idle wishes. The blunt truth is they do precisely what your hands make them do. They paint lays exactly where you put it- the words you wrote, not the ones you needed to write or thought about writing- are the only ones that appear on the paper. in the words of Ben Shaim "the painter who stands before an empty canvas must think in terms of paint"

What counts, in making art, is the actual fit between the contents of your head and the qualities of your materials. The knowledge you need to make that fit comes from noticing what really happens as you work – the way the materials respond, and the way that response (and resistance) suggest new ideas to you. It’s those real and ordinary changes that matter. Art is about carrying things out, and materials are what can be carried out. Because they are real, they are reliable.”

Be Discriminating; everything you make is useful - not everything you make is good.  You know the difference. 

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

 - Ira Glass

Quit Procrastinating; stop writing on your blog - make some paintings instead.

"Inspiration is for amateurs. I just get to work.” ― Chuck Close

Optical Elixer

Hey there - the 5 people who read my blog.  I have some new work for you!
ABSTRACT WORK
Yeah! seriously right?

These little buddies will be up in Redline Coffee and Espresso Bar (at Queen and Parliament) for the next month as part of Optical Elixer (a group show you should really check out).  Soooo... if you're in the area and you want a coffee or tea, or maybe a danish, some biscotti perhaps?  You can also look at my paintings!  Awesome.  They are on the bright red wall  (a superior location - and one of my favourite things about showing work in non-gallery spaces).  Colours against colours!  Yum! 

"I am Enlightened" 10 x 10 oil on panel

"An Explosion" 10 x 10 oil on panel

"Of a Void" 10 x 10 oil on panel

I should have probably waited until I take some better pictures of these guys because the last one I did so much more work on - and it looks far more cohesive now.... and actually not really bad like it does right now.  But that's ok - everyone likes to see process work right?

Don't worry though - there are more posts coming soon!  Me and one of my many talented artist friends Corey have made an unbreakable pinky swear oath to attend life painting every Friday at T.S.A.  So there's even figures in it for you. Ooooooohh yeah!

Giving it Away

Adventures in Art:

The other day I met an old lady while sketching in Allen Gardens.  We ended up talking for at least an hour about basically everything.  It pretty much made my day - and maybe her day as well.  I think we needed to find each other.  Sometimes I think you can be more honest with strangers than with people you actually know.  

Another page ripped out of my sketchbook.  All the good ones never stay in there - but they usually have the best stories.  

I think I should draw in public more.  It's the only way I make friends.

Encircle

"Encircle"

oil on panel 

Art trade for Feedback 
I don't know why I didn't put this up before.
 

An Artists Manifesto - Maria Abramovic

A GUIDE TO LIVING

(some favourite's below)  

1. An artist’s conduct in his life:


– An artist should not lie to himself or others
– An artist should not steal ideas from other artists
– An artist should not compromise for themselves or in regards to the art market
– An artist should not kill other human beings
– An artist should not make themselves into an idol
– An artist should not make themselves into an idol
– An artist should not make themselves into an idol 

4. An artist’s relation to suffering:


– An artist should suffer
– From the suffering comes the best work
– Suffering brings transformation
– Through the suffering an artist transcends their spirit
– Through the suffering an artist transcends their spirit
– Through the suffering an artist transcends their spirit   

7. An artist’s relation to inspiration:

– An artist should look deep inside themselves for inspiration

– The deeper they look inside themselves, the more universal they become

– The artist is universe

– The artist is universe

– The artist is universe

8. An artist’s relation to self-control:

– The artist should not have self-c ontrol about his life

– The artist should have total self-control about his work

– The artist should not have self-control about his life

– The artist should have total self-control about his work

9. An artist’s relation with transparency:

– The artist should give and receive at the same time

– Transparency means receptive

– Transparency means to give

– Transparency means to receive

– Transparency means receptive

– Transparency means to give

– Transparency means to receive

– Transparency means receptive

– Transparency means to give

– Transparency means to receive

10. An artist’s relation to symbols:

– An artist creates his own symbols

– Symbols are an artist’s language

– The language must then be translated

– Sometimes it is difficult to find the key

– Sometimes it is difficult to find the key

– Sometimes it is difficult to find the key

11. An artist’s relation to silence:

– An artist has to understand silence

– An artist has to create a space for silence to enter his work

– Silence is like an island in the middle of a turbulent ocean

– Silence is like an island in the middle of a turbulent ocean

– Silence is like an island in the middle of a turbulent ocean

12. An artist’s relation to solitude:

– An artist must make time for the long periods of solitude

– Solitude is extremely important

– Away from home

– Away from the studio

– Away from family

– Away from friends

– An artist should stay for long periods of time at waterfalls

– An artist should stay for long periods of time at exploding volcanoes

– An artist should stay for long periods of time looking at the fast running rivers

– An artist should stay for long periods of time looking at the horizon where the ocean and sky meet

– An artist should stay for long periods of time looking at the stars in the night sky

 

 

YEAH!

New paintings are happening.
(Sneak Preview!)