Work in progress- or lack thereof

Recurring elements in my paintings lately involve Infrastructure, Information, and Interaction. I’ve been attempting to apply these ideas with a contemporary viewpoint. The infrastructure of manmade objects like vending machines, trash cans, and phone poles contrasts with the role of nature in urban settings. The information conveyed by signs and advertisements, and the information concealed by shadowy figures. Interaction between characters in the composition- and with virtual personae, represented by some digital device. As these themes continue to reveal the experiences and contradictions of modern existence, my guide through this exploration is the cartoon.

"Road to Nowhere"

untitled painting almost done, originally uploaded by suelu23.

This painting is almost dry finally- by which I mean it should be totally dry in a few weeks. It took over a month for the last glaze to dry to the touch so I could start bringing back the drawing in places. That was one plus about living in Phoenix, was the speedy drying time! Anyway, now that I can put the final drawing down, I am not sure it needs as much as I thought. I do it in wax pencil and can erase it with turpentine easily, so I'm just going to play with it until it looks right. Or until I give up and start a new piece.
p.s. what do y'all think of that title? I've had trouble coming up with one for this piece.

Patient Painting

Untitled work in progress
When you lay down thin washes of paint, letting each coat dry before applying the next, you get optic mixing of colors which has a more luminous quality than straight mixing of wet paint. That's the theory at least. I had almost forgotten about glazing, having not used it since Painting 100. But it started to creep into my work during the thesis as a way to create cast shadows. In this new piece, I decided to embrace it entirely- after looking it up to make sure I was doing it right.


You can see in the close-up how the colors come through and mix visually. So far there is a wash of viridian green, alizarin crimson, and ultramarine blue. This still isn't finished... I will do at least 2 more glazes in some areas. In this cold weather, it can take 2 weeks for the paint to dry between coats. I'm trying to start another work while I'm waiting!

Thesis Show Opening Photos!

View a photo slideshow of the opening and the works here.
And look! I finally figured out how to post a video!

NEON!!!

The neon finally gets lit up. I did most of the assembly, but didn't get to bend the tubes of glass (the fun part!) They're 6 feet tall with metal signposts and concrete bases. Shown here set up in my thesis show, which I will have more pictures of later...