Wow! I love the figures, so Bosch-like! Just as dark as ever. I know you want brutal critiques, so I'll try my best and be critical, but my first reaction is that this is an exciting new direction for you!
For the first one: Wonderful washed out white tone, with the figures as stone-like as the walls. Their gaze it penetrating, more so with the lack of defined eyes. Very hollow and creepy, like moving statues. Especially the second from the right, there's something gnarled about her features that reminds me of Francis Bacon. It sneaks up on you too. I'm curious about your choice to feature female figures this time, and why the bathing suits? I love the moment of sudden light on the right foot of the central figure! It's like it's been suddenly exposed with a flashlight. Also, the lack of a table leg makes the image sort of surreal for me, like your memory interiors. And I'm curious about the white octagon above the doorway, it looks like a mirror reflecting a florescent light or just a blank plate devoid of meaning. The few critical things I found were: that the central figure is only half on her chair when I'm not sure if that's intentional, as the back of the seat of the chair seems too tiny. And I like the dividing wall in the hallway, but I wish it were more distinct from the hallway entry arch. At the top it's a little hard to distinguish which part recedes and which part is forward. Also, what if there was a bright red dot of an apple on the table, or something to contrast the dichromatic color scheme. It has a remarkable eerie tone, but what if there were something shocking like that to hype up the creepy factor? But it might disrupt the color world too much.
For the second: Wow, its like the wrestlers but this time they're imitating or bowing to a deerlike god! They're more animal-like and looking to this unaware creature for inspiration, or perhaps they're planning to attack. I can't help but imagine what someone looking out from that house would be thinking. There in the dead of night they spy a deer perched on their trampoline, which is pretty remarkable in itself, but then they see the two nudes crawling out of the shadows. I'd be freaked out. To me the windows of the house create a viewer from within the piece, and the darkness only adds to their presence, much like the eyeless sockets of the nudes. Interesting composition, it creates four different sections: the top left is the receding open space, the top right is the yellow house, the bottom right is the pair of nudes, and the bottom left is the animal on either a ring, a pool, or a trampoline? I'd like to see the animal and its ring take up more space and stretch up into the top right, atleast past the horizon line. Then it'd be more central, and both the house and the figures would be looking to it. I think that relationship would be more dynamic. But maybe that's not the point, and it's supposed to be more dreamlike and nonsequential? I'd love to know the inspiration for this one. I like that you're adding not only figures with arms to this piece, but also a non-human creature. (If it's a deer, it's back legs would bend the other way--I only know that cause I saw one walk by the other day). I like the way you painted the harlequin pattern for the circular border, with the different tones of blacks and blues. And did I mention how I like the lack of eyes? Wow, even the deer doesnt have any. Brilliant. I just really want the figures to pounce. There's so much tension in the stillness, as if its lurking. Unmistakably eerie.
I found your 12x16 painting to be the most intriguing of the two. I feel like if I didn't know you and your painting background, I'd think of three monk-like women in a decrepit old monastery. Knowing you, I see you and your two sisters in your childhood house, so now your painting is transformed into a crazy combination of the two: three creepy sisters staring at something.
The three things that interest me most: 1)What are they starring at? 2)The three darkest shadows in the doorways- I feel like I could get sucked right into them, and what would I find there? 3) I like the ambiguity of the octagonal white window-like thing above the arched doorway. Maybe its a mirror, but why would a mirror be placed so high above a door?
Amber Odhner
Wow! I love the figures, so Bosch-like! Just as dark as ever. I know you want brutal critiques, so I'll try my best and be critical, but my first reaction is that this is an exciting new direction for you!
ReplyDeleteFor the first one: Wonderful washed out white tone, with the figures as stone-like as the walls. Their gaze it penetrating, more so with the lack of defined eyes. Very hollow and creepy, like moving statues. Especially the second from the right, there's something gnarled about her features that reminds me of Francis Bacon. It sneaks up on you too. I'm curious about your choice to feature female figures this time, and why the bathing suits? I love the moment of sudden light on the right foot of the central figure! It's like it's been suddenly exposed with a flashlight. Also, the lack of a table leg makes the image sort of surreal for me, like your memory interiors. And I'm curious about the white octagon above the doorway, it looks like a mirror reflecting a florescent light or just a blank plate devoid of meaning. The few critical things I found were: that the central figure is only half on her chair when I'm not sure if that's intentional, as the back of the seat of the chair seems too tiny. And I like the dividing wall in the hallway, but I wish it were more distinct from the hallway entry arch. At the top it's a little hard to distinguish which part recedes and which part is forward. Also, what if there was a bright red dot of an apple on the table, or something to contrast the dichromatic color scheme. It has a remarkable eerie tone, but what if there were something shocking like that to hype up the creepy factor? But it might disrupt the color world too much.
For the second: Wow, its like the wrestlers but this time they're imitating or bowing to a deerlike god! They're more animal-like and looking to this unaware creature for inspiration, or perhaps they're planning to attack. I can't help but imagine what someone looking out from that house would be thinking. There in the dead of night they spy a deer perched on their trampoline, which is pretty remarkable in itself, but then they see the two nudes crawling out of the shadows. I'd be freaked out. To me the windows of the house create a viewer from within the piece, and the darkness only adds to their presence, much like the eyeless sockets of the nudes. Interesting composition, it creates four different sections: the top left is the receding open space, the top right is the yellow house, the bottom right is the pair of nudes, and the bottom left is the animal on either a ring, a pool, or a trampoline? I'd like to see the animal and its ring take up more space and stretch up into the top right, atleast past the horizon line. Then it'd be more central, and both the house and the figures would be looking to it. I think that relationship would be more dynamic. But maybe that's not the point, and it's supposed to be more dreamlike and nonsequential? I'd love to know the inspiration for this one. I like that you're adding not only figures with arms to this piece, but also a non-human creature. (If it's a deer, it's back legs would bend the other way--I only know that cause I saw one walk by the other day). I like the way you painted the harlequin pattern for the circular border, with the different tones of blacks and blues. And did I mention how I like the lack of eyes? Wow, even the deer doesnt have any. Brilliant. I just really want the figures to pounce. There's so much tension in the stillness, as if its lurking. Unmistakably eerie.
I found your 12x16 painting to be the most intriguing of the two. I feel like if I didn't know you and your painting background, I'd think of three monk-like women in a decrepit old monastery. Knowing you, I see you and your two sisters in your childhood house, so now your painting is transformed into a crazy combination of the two: three creepy sisters staring at something.
ReplyDeleteThe three things that interest me most: 1)What are they starring at? 2)The three darkest shadows in the doorways- I feel like I could get sucked right into them, and what would I find there? 3) I like the ambiguity of the octagonal white window-like thing above the arched doorway. Maybe its a mirror, but why would a mirror be placed so high above a door?