Two Shores: Step 1
For my first foray into the Artist’s Studio, I decided against featuring a figure painting, which seems to be the mainstay in the Artist’s Studio so far, and chose instead one of my non-figurative bridge/city pieces, or “man-scapes” as I like to call them. I thought this would allow me to go into further technical depth about the process that I also use to execute the backgrounds in my figure paintings. The figures in a painting often dwarf the importance of other aspects, especially in a discussion forum like this where brevity is necessary. So by focusing on a non-figurative subject, I hope to offer some fresh information for those of you who have carefully followed the execution of several figure paintings here in the past.
The first step for this particular painting turned out to be an unexpected and very drawn-out affair. I usually paint solely from locations that I find myself and reference material that I alone am responsible for gathering. This time, however, I decided to change my routine slightly and found myself on a three week manhunt for a fellow whom I’d never even met.
I’d already hashed out some visual ideas for the concept of the painting and had done some local hunting around for possible visual references, one of which accompanies this text. The basic idea, which is referenced in the title of the painting, “Two Shores”, was to use a bridge as a metaphor for technological progress. One shore would be completely absent of any sign of human alteration–pretty much just basic landscape stuff like trees, bushes, grass or what have you. The other shore would bear the lights and buildings of civilization. The bridge, a conduit in between the two, would have prominent lights (the light of wisdom, invention, etc.) and taillights flowing toward the distant civilized shore to indicate the direction of progress, and would have very solid concrete supports to underscore the power of industry.
Fine. Now how to turn that into an actual painting? Usually, the first step is to grab a camera and begin looking around for any useful structures, in this case a bridge, that can be incorporated into my basic idea. Unfortunately, I live in a landlocked state and there are precious few bridges to draw from. So from the get-go, I was already facing the necessity of having to come up with an alternative to simply parking myself on the beach to paint the local suspension bridge.
Tags: Damon Denys, Two Shores
