Last Friday, I drove to Brooklyn to meet with Hannah for the first time. Upon meeting her, I was immediately struck by her presence... confident, refined, at ease... well spoken and inquisitive. She was very welcoming and was eager to share with me her work space and paintings. Her unconventional androgynous portraiture was so much larger in scale than I expected it to be... even casually placed amidst her studio their presence filled the room. Realizing them, I have started to question my own ideas of social normality.
Conversing with Hannah is a volley back and forth. She wants to know my background, my taste, personal interests and more. Generously, she seems to want to share her own interests and process in return. She will be sending me artists to look at and I will be emailing her my responses to them. I believe working with her will be a very beneficial experience towards better discovering who I am as a painter and as an artist.
As for the work... I came in with the movie still painting that I was working on as a preliminary painting to the double exposure still (composed in Photoshop) I was prepping which I wanted to challenge myself with afterwards. What was I thinking in beginning this study... just what I was told in one of my critiques... "Stop being such a pleaser!". I knew I should have probably waited for my meeting with Hannah to start anything major and that I had discussed doing small assignments/ studies in painting the figure. Yet, I said... oh well... I want to paint film, to paint voyeurism, the social interactions that cause me to stare... to challenge myself. I have an idea so I will try it and if I need to change.... deal with that later.
If the concept is unclear here it is because if there is one I am not explaining it to myself or anyone else. I am working on something I find interesting and enjoy.
To my surprise, she thinks its very good direction for my work and is on board. I had a couple of friends ready to help and model for me for this semester but Hannah and I have decided to hold off for the time being as this will keep me quite busy for a while.., possibly returning to the idea later on in the semester.
Since meeting she has had me go to Home Depot collecting paint sample cards in developing a palette for the initial study ( right now it is just an under painting). She does this for her own work and showed me a book of her own paint cards. As my sources images, especially when I work on the double exposure, are quite complex, she is encouraging me to consider the work in sections...or the table setting, the figures, the mirrored background... and so on. I am not to be afraid of using neutrals and to consider my choices on which parts of the image I paint in detail and what I leave unsaid.
to be continued.....
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