And Again...

 

‘White Pears With Barry Stedman Vessel #4’

oil on canvas/16″ x 20″/August 2016

 

Continuing with the painterly exploration of the increasingly-familiar Barry Stedman vessel juxtaposed with a selection of the even more familiar whitewashed (re)model(led) pears, with, on this occasion, the vessel being observed with the plane first featured in version 1 of the sequence to the fore, its glazes of colour showing slight variations to those on the reverse, and also a variation in the configuration of pears to the right, with one immediately behind the pair to the front of the shallow recessive space, crowding them together in vaguely Morandi-esque fashion. As with the previous example, the underpainting was a thin sap green wash, the pale grey over it allowing a certain amount of tint and, hopefully, luminosity to glow through.



Next...

 

 

A new painting in progress, continuing the inclusion of the Barry Stedman vessel into the composition, in relation to the familiar whitewashed pears, with its splashes of colour amongst the predominant whites and greys. This occasion and example sees a return to the single canvas, given the uncertainty over the recent pair of diptych format paintings, and the portrait orientation featuring the upper and lower shelf formal device upon which the various depicted objects sit. In a departure from the habitual, this time the underpainting is not a sienna wash but rather a pale green that relates to the cast of the natural light present in the conservatory studio, tinted thus by virtue of the proximity of the garden and dense woods beyond: the particular challenge now is retain some this green underpainting and its luminosity as the painting progresses…





On Returning...

 

‘White Pears With Barry Stedman Vessel #2’

oil on canvas/12″ x 16″ and 20″ x 16″ (diptych)/July 2016

 

After the tardiest spell of recent times – with areas of productivity having relocated to the site of the garden and the act of looking largely having transferred to the televised coverage of the European football Championships (particularly enjoying Wales’s amazing progress through the tournament, as well as that of Iceland and Hungary) for the duration – a more concerted return to studio practice over the last week or so has resulted in the processing of a second diptych depicting our object-of-desire Barry Stedman vessel in the company of the familiar whitewashed pears. On this occasion, the reverse plain of the vessel is featured to that previously, similar to its opposite in design but exhibiting certain particularities. Again, doubts exist and persist as to whether the diptych format is entirely successful – it does obviously have a different object-quality to a single canvas, which creates slightly more of a dialogue with the subject-matter, but the composition would probably be better served being viewed within a single frame.