Behind the Scenes: Exploratory Drawings
Behind the Scenes: Exploratory Drawings for the Eternal Color Series
It is with a view to process that I share the work below— the behind-the-scenes sketches that you might not get a chance to experience in the creation of a body of work. From 2016-208 I created the Eternal Color portrait series. The series was comprised of twelve 5-foot portraits on panel. Below you’ll find examples of the work that developed into the series of portraits.
The first part of the process was to find a visual style for the works. I wanted to combine elements of portrait with elements of abstraction in the background. To make these exploratory sketches, I combined Stabilo Tones, wax pastels, and colored paper. There are elements of these that are inspired by the work of the Symbolists, specifically the style was inspired by the pastel drawings of Odilon Redon. There are also threads of inspiration drawn from the watercolor-enhanced lithographs of Marc Chagall.
Exploratory Drawings for the Eternal Color Series.
Post-Impressionist color theory is very inspiring, and I wanted to see what it look like to use a “saturated palette” in creating some of these images (for example, all of the colors dominated by an intense singular color.
In order to explore the saturated color line of inquiry I ended up creating a separate body of work. To make these, I explored what it would be like to use colors that are not normally found on faces. Some of that exploration began in the wax crayon stage, and was further developed into this separate series in order to work out the idea in practice.
Ultimately that direction didn’t feel right for the Eternal Color series, though working it out visually was interesting in its own way.
These exploratory drawings are a glimpse into the many months of preparation that go into making a new body of work. The drawings are a connection to the raw, unfiltered, imaginative part of creating one of the paintings.