In My Room

A large departure from my usual colourful - bordering on acidic - palette, I have been working with just lemon yellow, cobalt blue and cadmium red with white to work with a chromatic grey scale. My monochromatic works such as my charcoal drawing and printmaking have most believably captured my subject, thus working from chromatic greys and focusing mainly on tone seems to be a wise way to develop my painting.
Main influences: Lucian Freud, Marlene Dumas and Francis Bacon.

oil paint on A1 primed paper

details - i love how just the simplest marks can form the human body. Often leaving areas blank (such as the toes here) is actually more effective

Preparatory print-making

Working from a few snapshots, I decided to work from a limited palette - incredibly limited at just one colour! I want to work on improving my eye for tone.
Here are 4 monoprints on around A5 paper, looking at partially abstracting forms as well as singling out tone, whilst placing the figure believably in space.
I really enjoyed creating an atmospheric setting - I rolled ink onto copper plates, then rubbed and swiped away from tissue paper, pencils and cotton buds. I love some of the mark making debris left on the white patches.
The first two were done simply in ruby red etching ink, whilst the latter two are a mixture of red and yellow ochre to turn down the brightness.

Katie

Daddy

In my Room

In my Room II

feedback - working from observation

Following feedback from my tutor, he informed me that whilst my previous drawing was well realised, I would benefit from observational studies. This is difficult seeing as the majority of life classes require payment and most people are not willing to sit for a portrait. 

Here is a quick 15 minute painting I did of a studio mate before she decided to move.
Make your judgement - I hate it.

A5 preparatory graphite sketch

approx A2 canvas. Yellow oil paint on pink ground

detail