Moving on

It has been a while since I added anything to this blog.  I got fed-up with struggling to keep this afloat.  I have come to a point in my life where I am now taking art more seriously.  I have battled with style and influence so much so that I now do not paint with a brush, I paint with a palette knife.  I have my easel and I have my paints and in some respects I have come home with my attempt at a modern abstract expressionistic way of creating new pieces.  When I am using my emotions to help decide how a piece should be it means that they are different in the way that they turn out.  I have very little control over this and some photographs of recent pieces will show this in due course.  In some respects it is an interesting time but having to face facts that I am never satisfied is still a major concern and one that I have to come to terms with.  More coming as and when but not with such a long gap. 

Stormy Seas

Stormy Seas

This like 'River and City Theme' is painted on MDF canvas board.  I look upon them as a way of working on the style and trying things out.  This was painted whilst watching "Pirates of the Caribbean' which is why it has this title.  I was inspired for a while by storms and how they affect the sea, I am not going to say that this is how this piece ended up looking this way because it doesn't have a total storm feeling.

As I have always stray away from black it is interesting to see how I would have coped with that having to convey a sense of the storm, but I have used red and a darker blue to give a slight sense of that.  Some areas of this painting for me give an impression of being painting quickly and drifting away like some kind of coloured cloud.  I have been looking at the sky and watching clouds recently to see how I could use the randomness of clouds as an inspiration, whilst at the same time trawling the internet to find other works.

I seem to have an eye for working with colour that I had no idea about at all.  Certainly this was not the case in the past, at school I was hopeless mainly because we were working towards realism and that is an area it is safe to say that I am not comfortable with.

There are at least four other paintings that are on the go, the struggle continues and yet the end results for me are very pleasing indeed.  With this in mind, I have taken the decision to take my art serious and to work towards a moment in my life where I can call myself an abstract painter.  That feeling is very exciting and so the summer will prove to be a turning a point or not, let's wait and see.

A Remembrance of a Previous Summer

Remembrance of a Previous Summer

As I was saying in the last blog entry I prefer things to be square and I haven't worked out why that is.  It leaks out in other areas as well, as I like notebook with squared paper in them.  It started off as wanted to have the lines closer together, but I am straying from the point, here is another piece that is taking the new style towards an area that makes me feel happy with.

This piece went through a few changes that is for sure.  All my work gets over painted again and again until it feels comfortable to say that is a finish piece.  That is why this piece is from June and there is a big gap.  I didn't stop painting during that time, although I didn't paint as much as I could have, it was because I was unsure of the direction to take three other works, one of which is the largest sized canvas so far.

In the middle of working on this piece it was not unlike 'History of the River' in as much that there was a large expanse of blue in the middle which had to go.  It was not because it was similar as the previous work but because it didn't feel right.  When the two sides were joined it was clear that this was the way to go.  For me when I look at this piece I know that I am talking about the warmth of summers gone.  It was that simple and I couldn't argue with that.  At the top of this painting is a patch of almost grey this was inspired by the summer of 1976 when I went on holiday with my parents and the beautiful summer that we had broke with a storm and for the week or so that we were there it rained most of the time.

It is very satisfying to produce work that has a personal emotion for me and I hope that when someone owns this and has it on their wall that they are moved in much the same way as me.

River and City Theme

River and City Theme

A month went by before this next painting was produced and that for me I think shows to a certain degree.  Once you get your nose in a good art book, the influences might leak in and that isn't a good thing.  As far as I can remember there was a need to divide this painting into two halves and that was easily done by being so heavily influenced by the previous work (History of the River).

I don't sit there and work out what is going to happen, it morphs out in front of my own eyes and this seems to be the best way forward.  I could never copy another artist's style as I am not a confident enough person to think that I could produce something in the style of Kandinsky or even Turner.  To a certain degree it is not a bad thing to emulate another artist but for me I wanted a style that would scream out my name.  Being influenced by Kurt Schwitters with my collage work meant that I was making art that screamed his influence and I guess that was why I had to sit down and think about calling it a day.

My preferred shape for paintings is square and I loved the finished work when it is that shape.  I have no idea why and it will be something I want to escape from.  This small piece of MDF canvas board that this piece is painted on is for me the sketch for the larger canvas but I know that my style will dictate the end result.  It is like some subconsciousness leaking out from the eye to the hand onto the canvas.  Which is very exciting and something I will develop over time. 

History of the River

History of the River

Inspired by 'Earth Says Hello' and wasting no time this slightly bigger piece was produced.  It was produced by using the same method and it proved that for me it was working.  A close artist friend of mine had said that in my earlier works that they were busy and I had taken this to heart.  I realised that there was a lot going on and the reason for this was that there was a lot going on in my life at the time.  Thinking about this long and hard for a while I realised that once I was settled in a new home that I would use that feeling and that emotion to plough it onto the canvas and make art that reflected those emotions.

There is a lot of blue in this piece and that was a conscience decision to make sure that happened this time.  There is never a plan but sometimes thought is given to colours but never to direction.  Through my eyes I could see that this was piece that was like a coloured map.  I may have been mapping out the future, but what was this piece telling me?  

Inspired by artists that listen to music as they paint to evoke an emotion.  I was listening to an American band by the name of The Preston School of Industry and so as I was listening to the album I knew that for me that the song that was speaking to me the most was called 'The History of the River'  as this had a lot of blue in it, it was safe to say that this represented water, a river in other words.  Green was the land covered with trees but what about the fiery orange, well I took that to mean that was the land which man has devastated and built on and in some case over-populated.  This was in some respects an important piece in the development of my art.

Both of these piece being produced very quickly with only a couple of weeks between them was also important to maintain the style I was working towards and in that respect I was right.  There is a new to produce and so that is something I will be doing over the summer.  There is a need within me to release the artist. 

Earth Says Hello

Earth Says Hello

It was after moving in November 2011 that there was a sense that I had arrived at a place where I was going to feel comfortable and most importantly I could call it home.  I think that it was because of this that the paintings of late 2011 were the turning point that would lead me to the style we see in 'Earth Says Hello'

This was the first painting in a while that I had got excited about and was clearly showing me the way I wanted to go.  It produced an emotion of satisfaction that I had not felt for a while.  It was the turning point, and although I have reached the cross-roads before, this one I could sense was important.  Not only to me but to my artwork as well.

Although I worked indoors sometime in poor light, I was surprised when standing back that I felt I could see a slightly fat pig on the right hand side of this piece and it was not something that I wanted to paint over.  I was glad that I could come to terms with the fact that it didn't seem to matter.  It was part of the process of making art that these things happen.  I knew that this piece was speaking to me and it was shouting out loud that this was the way to go.  These warm colours and the feeling of being alive that I got from the piece was enough to let me know I was doing good.

I hope that this feeling continued, any time that was left between works meant that there would be a change and it isn't always for good.  it is sometimes a shame that for me this happens. There is a message in what I am saying and I can hear it loud and clear.  

The title of this piece was inspired by a previous painting that I am not proud of but was named after a album title that I was listening to at the time.  When this piece was finished the television programme that had been on was playing 'Hello Star Shine' and Earth says hello is the second line from that song.  I think that titles sometimes are really hard with abstracts but if it comes to me through an organic way then that should be the title.

A Fresh Start

David A. Sharman

I have been working towards a period in my life when I was happy with the way that my paintings were going.  I have always been someone who is hyper critical of my work, be it written, painted or photographed.  I spend a lot of time looking for inspiration in different places, from the internet to my surroundings.  I have watched a lot of documentaries on art which have had an impact on my work.  From the St. Ives Artists to the Abstract Expressionist artists of America but out of all the art and styles of art I have been attracted to I have always liked abstraction and those who are able to show their emotions that are employed on the canvas.

This does not mean to say that I don't like other styles of painting, although some leave me cold, I have to say that I am a fan of Turner and some of his later works which do have a large abstract feeling to them.  Other artists that I am attracted to are simply because of their lifestyle and the work that they produce under difficult circumstances, such as Pollock for example.  I have always looked beyond the art and at the artist as well.  For me this is just as important to try to understand why a piece was constructed just as much as the finished product.

I am not sure any more that I have a lot to say about my art, but I will with this blog try to explain how a piece comes about and what I am trying to say to a certain degree, but for the most colours are dictated by emotion and mood.  There is if I am honest with myself a large amount of randomness with each recent piece that is left to the viewer to make their mind up how the end piece effects them and how it conveys a message to them.

As I have said I needed to take a long walk with my art, going through a huge collage phase that become at the end of it very unsatisfying because of the lack of control of the end product having to use found images all the time.  With abstract art, the eye and hand control the end product and it has to be said that this produces a better result for me.  With the option of using art as therapy which is important to me I have a chance to make sure that I am producing art that makes me happy, the darker colours of life are something that I stray away from, black is a colour that these days I hardly use.  I know that it will make a visit to the canvas when I am happy that it is used for it's effect and not an emotion which is dark inside me.

With all this in mind it is fair to say that nothing before 2012 will be displayed on this blog and that the road less travelled is calling me to kick the dust off my shoes and show the world how I have developed a style that I am proud of and am willing to show the world.

David A. Sharman

June 2012