Thursday, July 7, 2016

Big Blank Canvas

If you look through my blog, you'll see that most of my paintings since May 2015 have been small: 6x6", 4x5", 4x4", some 3x3". An occasional 8x8", 9x12", 10x10". The biggest is 16x20".

Last weekend, with Caroline and Emmy as both my patronesses of the arts and my shopping companions, I purchased a 30x30" canvas, the biggest that's ever come into my studio.

As we walked through the art store, I kept saying, I have no idea what to do with something this big! 

But something in me has the urge to go big(ger).

So, that's where I'm going.

Once home, in the middle of the night after that acquisition, I woke briefly. What rose to the surface before I sank back into sleep was this:

I can use this canvas like a blackboard. I can "write" and "erase" on it. 

Write. Erase. 

Write. Erase.

Write.

Write.

Erase.  

I can doodle with a pencil. 

I can make one hundred 3x3" ink sketches. 

I can paint a tree. 

I can create an abstract with pastels. 

I can do whatever I want. 

As many times as I want.

Today, I made some marks.

playing with big: charcoal and pastel lines on 30x30" stretched canvas,
4x5" postcard in corner for perspective

4 comments:

Simone said...

YOOHOO!

Your first really big canvas!

Wow, I am so happy for you!


Indeed, it looks so big, but indeed, you can paint over anytime. It is just a big playground. Nothing can ever go wrong. Maybe you end up after years painting it white again. And in the meantime you had a lot of fun.
But maybe (actually: probably) something wonderful will come out!

Congratulations!

dotty seiter: now playing said...

Thanks for your enthusiasm and your shared perspective, Simone! I have painted a few larger canvases previously, but didn't mention them for two reasons: (1) I painted them prior to starting my blog and (2) I painted them before abstraction had ever crossed my mind!

Sheila said...

Awesome start my bold, inspiring friend! I have a large canvas to paint for my cousin, and THAT gives me the heebie jeebies! LOL. Best wishes, you will rock it!

dotty seiter: now playing said...

Sheila, thanks for your encouragement. I haven't touched this canvas since this first mark-making, but I love seeing it every time I go to my studio. Eager to hear more about—and eventually see—what you do on your own large canvas. Are you still in a hotel currently, by the by? I think of you often in this nomadic time.

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