Tuesday 27 August 2013

Adrian and Lindy's Commission
 MORE MARBLES! 

Adrian and Lindy's Marbles
100 x 60 cm
Acrylic on Canvas

Adrian and my brother used to be in a band together, and that's how I got to know him. Since he saw my first large marbles painting, he's been threatening to commission me, but only after they renovated their house. Now, many of my friends tell me they still want works of mine, I don't really take it to mean anything, I know they have good intentions but fine art is expensive - I can't afford to buy paintings, so I don't really expect it of them - I just take it as a nice complement, and move on. 
But at my brothers birthday braai in June Adrian mentioned that they had gotten decorators in for quotes, and my ears perked up! And we started talking marbles.

There are many things to love about doing commission work for a friend. The goal of every single painting I make, is for them to end up in someones home, to bring joy to people, and brighten up a room, or a day. And with a commission that's a given, with the added bonus that  there's a part of you (as opposed to a stranger) on their wall, part of the decor of their lives.
Also along with that, every painting becomes an ad for my work,  tiny billboard in their lounge, to be seen by friends and family who don't yet know me, and to entice them to buy my work. AND my favourite part, I get to see my work being enjoyed every time I'm invited to one of their legendary braais, nothing is quite as satisfying / fulfilling as seeing that end result. 

Adrian and Lindy gave me the colour scheme they were working with, shade of paint on which the painting would hang, and the spot colours they'd like to use in the room. This was the first time I got to work from that perspective; I had to desaturate most of the colours, and change some of them entirely, which was really fun, and I suspect that will happen quite a bit in the future! We had a 'viewing' halfway through to check out the colours in the specific lighting and surroundings, and I changed some tones - I can couch for doing this, it was super helpful!
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Long story short: I love this painting, it's one of my favourite marbles works because I managed to keep it loose and a little rougher than usual, there's a lot more visible brush strokes, and I've been aiming to go in that direction with my paintings.

I THINK I'm reflected 6 times, and reflections included there are something like 92 marbles in this painting.. but I lost count a couple of times, so that could be wrong! ;) 

1 comment:

  1. Love your work ,and great to see someone from SA blogging about their art.

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