
Mixed-media on canvas, 100x100cm. © Mari French 2016
After struggling with a couple of canvases this week, I was beginning to lose the plot with this one. Remembering what I’d recently been advised* – ‘Don’t let your painting know you’re scared of it’ – I threw caution to the wind and began editing the image by vigorously covering certain areas with paint, then adding a variety of marks with oil sticks, paint pens and ink pencils.
Some marks were robust, some delicate and twirling or meandering. Several of the latter seem to be suggesting etoliated, wiry but fragile blooms? I love this colour palette, luminous, soft and atmospheric.
Standing back, I’m quietly excited by this one.
Astonishing! There’s so much to admire in this and such a wonderful use of colours, both strong and muted.
Thanks for your enthusiastic response to the painting, Michael, really appreciated!
Won’t tell you what it looks like to me. But needless to say it puts me in a happy place. Loving the colours you have used, and the contrast of light in foreground an the brooding darker blues in the distance.
Thanks Jed, think I can probably guess but thanks for resisting! And I love your observations on the colour and light. 🙂