Monday January 18. Developed drip paintings and a new start.

In my last blog I shared some experiments with controlled dripping of paint. I start with showing “final” images of these more developed paintings. The pictures have changed emphasis during development, and some of them have been rotated or inverted. That simple process can completely change effect or meaning. Paul Klee famously did open-ended work and gave paintings a poetic title after they were finished. I venture some possible titles here. Here is “Around”-

The underwater quality here suggests “Caught”-

The first one I did may be “Uprising”-

Inverting this one, which started as a kind of landscape, is “Floating”-

This one, that I haven't done too much work on, is “Tunnel”.

Getting back to looking at old drawings and paintings, as I was 2 or 3 weeks ago, I have been looking at Leonardo da Vinci, especially his invented backgrounds. These areas have not been seen as very important, but they show a different aspect of his thinking - more free and playful. Look at The Virgin of the Rocks-

Closing in on the top left-

And again from another photo-

I decided to start a study of this area, but using different colours. I started drawing out on a canvas with brown acrylic-

Building up the tones-

Started to work in thin ultramarine blue.

Have got to this stage now. Still a lot to do.

How far to go? How true to the original? How much personal touch to add? Stay tuned.........