"Plein Air at Xidi Village (Day 2)"

I have started another large painting. When I was at Xidi last September, I saw so many artists plein air painting all over the place. I really want to do several serious paintings to reflect the lives in this small place. You have seen I painted quite a few doorways there, but that was just the necessary foundation work. This one I start to involve more figures, which are the artists in the village. I know it is a challenge for me to paint any serious painting with my fragmented time, but I will give a try.

" A Rainy Day in Chicago"

I feel happy about what I did today. I have been doing research on monochromatic painting for a while. The advantage of monochrome is automatic color harmony. I don't need to worry that color gets muddy. So I can concentrate on value design and texture design. You have seen a small version of this painting earlier.  This one is 18" x 24".

How to market my large paintings is a good question. I did show my large work in galleries, even very good galleries. However, the result was not very good. So I kind of giving up on selling my large paintings at this moment. If you are interested in collecting my large paintings, please send me an email. We can work out a deal.

"Xidi Village 1"

This is another large painting I did based on a reference photo I took at the Xidi village. I have extended my paintings from doorways to buildings, and from monochrome to color. I am really concerned that the painting will get muddy easily when I shift from mono to color. I have paid serious attention to the color harmony. Also I have realized that I may not want to paint this kind of archaic painting too large. I don't know exactly why. Some how I feel the history is too heavy on me. I feel pressured when I look at the aging texture of the ancient structures. I might have run into something in my previous life. Who knows.

I want to pause my Xidi series now. A new phase of my art starts soon. I will travel again and keep busy.

“Xidi Doorway 4"

This is my fourth Xidi doorway painting. The difference between this one and the previous ones is the size. This one is a 18" x 24", while my first one was a 6" x 8". I hope you don't see too much difference from the photo images. It is easier to show painterly effect with small paintings. That is why I did this exercise. I want to make sure I can maintain the painterly look with my large paintings.  I want to practice this style a little more to stabilize the approach. So I don't need too much warmup time in the future if I want to painting this kind of monochromatic works.

"AAU Portrait Painting 9"

This my favorite  portrait I did at AAU last summer. With the cool and warm light illumination, I got so many opportunity playing color. It is a relatively large painting (18" x 24") taken me three days to paint from live.

My current painting project is going well. It is the 4th day since I started. I am working long hours everyday and run into quite a few challenges. I think it will take me two or three more days I can reach to a some sort of finishing point. Different from my AAU time, I don't have much opportunities doing long term art projects nowadays. However, I try my best to do at least one or two more in depth paintings every year.

“Tibor Nagy Study 4"

I came back to Austin yesterday. From now on to early December, I will have a relatively long time at home. It is good time I will shift to study mode and hope I can have some progress in art. Nowadays, I have less and less time to learn, but I know many areas I need to improve. I am trying my best to use any of my fragmented time to move on.

This painting I did last month before the four workshops I have taught lately. It is a relatively large painting (18" x 24"). I wanted to see if it is possible I may keep the painterly style even with a large painting. I am still examine the marvelous paint work that Tibor Nagy did, and tried to achieve a similar effect. I used the monochromatic approach so I was able to concentrate on the paint application, but not color. This painting was done with both acrylic and oil. Different from my alla prima approach, I did 4 layers on this painting: acrylic darks, acrylic lights, oil for details, knife work with oil. You all know I did many small daily paintings, but I want to do more larger paintings from now on.

"Awakening" (Partial)

Finally, I finished my long term painting "Awakening". Since the painting is semi-dry, I can't get a good photo. I got a ton of glares. Doing a large painting is so different from my small daily studies. I go a way deeper in designs and paint effects. My AAU study during the summer has really laid the foundation for doing large paintings. I like the light effects and light consistency of the painting. I really want to do more projects like this. It gives me more opportunities to deal with detail modeling and dramatization. I consider to submit this painting for the 2013 OPA show. I missed this year's show, so I want to be prepared a little earlier.

I have not done any small paintings for a while, but I hope I can pick it up soon. Life keeps on going. Problems are inevitable, but if we do not give up, we will be there eventually. So, I don't want to talk about my demons any more. I am awakening gradually.

“Awakening (Day 5)"

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have been working on a long term painting project. Instead of showing the final result only, I decided to share the process with you. The project is the continuation of my calligraphy/still_life painting I started a couple of months ago. The Chinese character in the image means "awakening". I combine the calligraphy with a scene of a Buddhist shrine, since the word "Buddha" happens to mean "the awakened one" in sanskrit. Awakened from what? That is a very interesting question, but you can think about when you have time.

This painting is relatively large: 18" x 24". I have spent five days on it already. I work only several hours each day on it, since I have so many other things on my plate. I have to spend long hours dealing with the demon in me as I talked about previously. Thanks to all of you who wrote me wonderful comments on my battle. We will talk more on that topic later. With this painting, I used a very different approach. I don't have a fixed setup. I design the light and value in mind first, then found representative objects to form the scene. I combined painting from life and using photos. I altered freely the sizes of objects according to my design. I used computer graphics to simulate the effect so I can visualize the result before I paint it. As a matter of fact, the image you see today is not a pure photo of my painting. The calligraphy is an overlay to show me the effect. With this approach I can set up the still life on canvas directly and gradually, instead of having a fixed setup in my shadow box. I did a way more thinking than push paint. With this approach I gained more freedom. I can vividly put on canvas objects which do not exist in the real world. Now this painting has began to show the effect I wanted. I am creating an illusion in front of you. However, my intention of this illusion is to help you, including myself, to be awakened from the delusion of the world, and see the true reality.

"AAU Figure Painting 3 (Day 3)"

On the third day of this figure painting, I worked on the edges and color. Zhaoming talked about skin tones. If you want to make her complexion look pail, you put cool colors in the area between light mid tone and the core shadow. It worked well. I made the background a little warmer. I did not paint her face much because I'd like to have her shoulder and knee as focus centers. This painting is done. It is not bad, but I need more drama. I hope my next one will be better.

"AAU Figure Painting 3 (Day 2)"

Today, I worked on this figure painting from life. It is the second day on this one. I don't have enough experience of doing a painting more than one day. All my previous two figure paintings were not very successful. On the second day, I worked on modeling the details. The hardest part was painting the shadow side. I don't want to show too much, but I can't leave it out. I am happy with this one because I have seen progress. When I did my first multi-day figure painting, the painting got worse on the second day. For my second figure painting, the second day work didn't make too much difference than that of the first day. For this painting (the third one), it looks better on the second day. I have one more day working on this painting. I hope I will not ruin it.

"AAU Figure Painting 3 (Day 1)"

Today, I have started a new figure painting. It will take 3 days to finish. This image shows what I got so far. The color of painting becomes more important now. I feel more confident in dealing with proportion, anatomy, and modeling. Painting large is no longer a problem. Gradually, I will be able to pay more attention to edges, composition, paint quality, and details. The progress is noticeable.

"AAU Figure Painting 2 (Day 2)"

I have been working on this painting whole day yesterday. It wasn't as smooth as the first day. I spent many hours on the leg in the front. It was soooo hard. I was painting something that I don't want people to see, but I can't simply remove it. That foot in dark is the most difficult part of the whole painting. I think the experience is more important than the painting.

"AAU Figure Painting 2 (Day 1)"

Today is the figure painting day. We started a new painting. Since the failure of my previous figure work, I was a little apprehensive at the beginning. But it turns out rather smooth. I have learned that the brushes I use for the early work were too small. For this painting I used brushes about 2" wide. They are the cheap house painting brushes. You can get a dozen of them for $2 at the Home Depot. Similar to the portrait I did yesterday, I concentrated on modeling. This is a relatively new skill for me. When I do still lives, I don't model seriously, because the objects I paint are much simpler. I was concentrated on light distribution and how to achieve painterly effects. But figure is so subtle and there is no room for mistakes. Zhaoming is a wonderful teacher. He sees things I can't, and give me tips working like a charm. I am so happy to see the progress.

"AAU Figure Painting (Day 2)"

I have spent about 6 more hours on this painting. It was a real struggle for me. I felt I was beating a dead horse. The painting did not progress much. However, I have benefited a lot from painting this one. I have gained new experience of observing the figure. Modeling the figure requires significant amount of sensitivity. I don't consider this painting is successful, but I have really learned a lot.

"AAU Figure Painting (Day 1)"

My AAU journey started yesterday. Zhaoming did a portrait demo in the morning and student painted in the afternoon. I did not paint because I have to get my ID and keys of my dorm room. AAU is an interesting place, all of its buildings are spattered all over SF. There are shuttle buses taking us from one place to another. It feels so good to be among young artists half of my age. The way they dress and talk really fascinated me.

Today is my figure painting day. We had a male model in his late sixties. Zhaoming did a figure demo in the morning with a monochromatic approach. In the afternoon I spent five and half hours and got major block in. The size of the painting is 18" x 24", the largest figure I have ever done. We will finish this painting on this Friday.