New paintings and regular art updates.
I have finally got back in the studio and started a new painting. It’s called Jupiter in Blue and will be part of an exhibition at Spode called “an Exhibition of Blue” from 1st February 2019.
The painting will be for sale so if anyone is interested in it please drop me a line!
The price will be £300. Its 24×30 inches so its a decent size.
Better get on with it.
X
1st layer done.
A blue bar of cerulean sky contrasts with sodium lighting as the sun creeps back up the sky. Of course it is the Earth turning on its axis that makes the sun appear to rise when it is actually us turning towards it.
The cloudy skies have prevented me seeing a fuzzy green comet which is in the sky somewhere above Orion, possibly near the constellation Gemini. I’ve tried looking out each night but the weather is too murky. I probably need to take the car out into the countryside to see it.
More cloud has blown across the sky so it’s actually got slightly darker. I heard a brief song from a bird about half an hour ago but the dawn chorus tends to be muted at this time of year. It improves in spring and early summer when the birds that inhabit the garden start to look for mates.
Listening to radio 4on the bbc and hearing news from around the world.
Life continues, partner is snoring. I might be soon. I think I will catch another 40 winks…
X
The astronomy bug has truly bit, and painting pictures like this get my mind working. As I paint I feel happy and enthralled It is like a drug to me. I get my fix out of painting. I can’t describe how I feel. Is it that thing called “flow”? The world goes on and I lose track of time.
Something pushes me to try harder to create or copy an image. The challenge of seeing it and trying to relay it on the canvas or computer. Some people can create photorealism. I’m not that good.. But I try.
This was a painting I did last year but I wasn’t satisfied with the result so today I have added white to the clouds. Sorted out the curve of the earth and added shadows below the clouds to try and create a more 3d effect.
It’s half past midnight and I’m having a rest .
Swift photos of the paintings. Taken on the kitchen with a cat hovering and wanting to walk across the canvases. One is a bit overshadowed by the lighting in the kitchen but I wanted to show that they could be hung in various directions.
I showed them to someone and they wanted them! So they will not be available at the Orme group of artists exhibition on Saturday and Sunday but at least I can exhibit them so people can see what I can do…
My poor eyes! Lots of details …
Spent a productive 3 hours today on this…. Very complicated. The 1st canvas needs to be completed by Friday. I’m getting a bit tired so I think I will leave it till tomorrow…..
Trying to get the details is the problem. The image I’m working from is a bit pixelated. I’m bothered about getting the smoothness and roundness of Jupiter and also the blending between the different areas…. Oh well I’ll keep working
X
I follow a website called http://spaceweather.com and I just read about a massive solar flare 159 years ago called the Carrington event. The flare caused a huge Coronal Mass Ejection of such force that it caused telegraph stations to be put out of action including telegraph paper catching fire. This all happened in the Victorian era, when electrical gadgets were very primitive.
Reading further apparently these events happen around every 100 years so we are overdue another one, the effect of which could be very serious for our modern electronic world.
There is lots of other information there if you are a nerd like me, including near earth objects that come close to earth (measured in multiples and fractions of the distance between us and the moon), information about comets and meteor showers.
I wanted to paint Jupiter a couple of years ago, but my technique with acrylics does not quite work. I think I don’t blend colours as well as I could, still I had a go…..to me thus almost looks knitted…
What would Jupiter think if he was an ancient God?
You knitted me? That can’t be right,
I am great Jupiter, not a wooly jumper?
In all my days of pomp and might,
I was never treated rougher.
My power is great, my influence strong,
I never wore a cardie…
My orbit is extremely long,
And I am very hardy.
My storms last centuries you know,
They do not soon unravel,
So take your woollen paint and go,
As I through space do travel!
I love the challenge of trying to paint and draw astronomical objects. I have painted the Earth a few times, but also the Moon, the nebula shown here, Jupiter, and done digital drawings of the Earth and Moon, and the Veil Nebula plus other objects. I have also drawn Jupiter and Saturn.
I’m not an expert. They were all done without measuring the positions of features or stars, so for a real astronomer they probably look totally inaccurate. Still the universe is a wonderful place and the objects in it are amazing.
So if you can recommend an object I could have a go at painting I would be interested. I can’t promise it will be perfect. But I would have a go.
X
Just spent two hours going from a blank canvas to this. I’m trying to paint Planetary nebula NGC 2044. May have got the number wrong?
Anyway I saw the canvas last week and decided to have a go at something. I was going to paint the moon but decided on something a bit more colourful….hmm there I go again!
Anyway, astronomers out there will see its not accurate, but its bloody difficult to hold a book in one hand and the canvas in the other…not doing my back any good. Its now 2am. I have an appointment at 9.30am, I dont know why I’m still up? Well yes I do, my artists block is well and truly broken. I have finished 8 tiny paintings today and started this!
I sort of explode sometimes with art.. can’t help it. I am so full of ideas sometimes…..but…bed…ok..bed..hmmm…coffee? No..bed…
Night all!
This is the finished painting. Sorry about the lighting!
Mallaband-Brown