Don't worry…

Since early last year, I have been exploring abstract painting as a means of self expression. All the work I have created since then has been, in one sense, a snapshot of a particular moment in time and the state of my mind at that moment.

When I began my current body of work for April's exhibition at Union Gallery, I had in mind an over-arching theme that would intersect with that self-expression ideal. That theme was borne on my flight home from Fayetteville in November. Leaving behind Megan there and heading back home, I had a feeling of being torn between two geographical locations and between two possible futures. This, I decided, could become a loose framework around which my work could be built.

In late December when I finally put paint to panel, that torn feeling still had coherence. However the feeling had diminished somewhat with the sad abandonment of the Fayetteville Artist's Alliance, which had been the town's main attraction, after Megan. The torn feeling was lessened even further, when Megan herself left Fayetteville to visit Edinburgh.

With the loose framework that the torn feeling had provided now largely missing, I was left floundering. I knew that my paintings must mean something to me, that I needed the initial meaning as a connection, as a sort of internal badge of worth because without it I can all too often end up feeling as if I am simply moving paint around, making a decoration, not art and that is not enough for me.

Unfinished, untitled, not even dry yet, at 24x24"
this is the largest painting I have worked on
for months. (© Stewart Bremner 2012)

Yesterday, I set aside my worries, about both my self-imposed (false) framework and moving onto a large panel and began my biggest solo painting since July. I simply let myself move and, I think, maybe, that it is going to be one of the strongest pieces in my show.

In retrospect, my worrying has been a bit silly. I find my meaning, that internal badge, examining my mind state in the moments of creation. The idea that I was going to use one over-arching theme as a framework clearly acts against the spontaneity that my approach benefits from. It is little wonder, then, that I managed to tie myself up in knots.

With fourteen small pieces in a state of mostly finished and five more large panels to work on, my half of April's exhibition is coming along nicely. I've made some of the best paintings of my career and I've enjoyed the process of painting more than I even have before. If I can keep that in mind and stop bloody worrying, the show is going to be a killer!

A third of the way there

The studio, today

I've been working on my next show for over a month now, with a day or so over two months remaining until the exhibition opens. So far I have painted twelve pieces, of which only three are still in need to attention. Several pieces whose finalising was last week proving troublesome, have now been upgraded from 'most likely finished' to 'almost definitely finished'. It was a pleasure both doing so and being able to do so.

This afternoon I sat with all twelve paintings and watched. What stuck me was that my favourite piece has kept changing over the course of making the work. In the first rush, I created two strong pieces and then felt I had a slump. For a while I was worried that I would not be able to paint anything that would rival those first two. Today I realise that I have, almost certainly more than once. Indeed, I might even have made some better!

Another aspect of the work I've been pleased to note today is its evolution. I began this series with a narrow, if poorly-defined, theme. As the work has progressed, this theme has by necessity expanded. I have thus become less absolute about what I want the paintings to express. Changing in this manner chimes with a narrative that runs though much of my work (which I could, if I was feeling particularly pretentious, call a meta-theme): the meeting of order and chaos. In this instance, where before there was rigid order in a single narrow theme, now chaos it taking the dominant position (and I am attempting to keep up).

The style of the paintings has also changed over the month. Initially (at least in my mind), the work had some similarities to my later Hidden Messages pieces. Moving from this, the work at first change darkened and became more intense, before more recently becoming airy and lighter. Yet though all of this, I can still see a commonality, beginning with my normal orange, blue and black colour palette.

Next week, some large boards that I have on order will be ready. It has been a while since I painted on anything larger than one square foot and it is going to be a challenge to increase my scale. However, it is a challenge that I am am going to relish!

Inside, outside

In the past few weeks, Megan Chapman and I have visited more galleries in Edinburgh than I ever have in such a short period before. We have seen so much art in all of these galleries, that much of it has blended together. This in itself is telling, yet after writing big art thoughts last week, this week I am more inclined to  look inwards, rather than out.

There is now a little over two months to go before my rather important joint show at Union Gallery with Kevin Low. One of the effects of looking at so much art recently has been to pull my ideas about what I want to paint and how I want to paint in different directions. Given that I have already began working towards the show, this was not altogether welcome. So it was that, after a splurge of gallery visits last weekend, I settled down to get some painting done.

As it happened, I did not quite paint as much as I had hoped to. My unfocussed mind would not quite settle and so I resorted to the time-honoured technique of tidying up my studio and taking care of other necessary art-related tasks. Principally, this involved painting the wooden edges of my pieces.

One of my recently finished pieces, currently untitled.
© Stewart Bremner 2012; Mixed media on board, 12x12"

To begin, I painted the edges white, however I was concerned that this would cause them to blend into the gallery walls. Instead I tried using black, which seemed the most natural next choice. Again, there were some drawbacks. Both colours (or, rather, tones) worked well and, being unable to settle on one, I opened the debate up to the interwebs. I received many and varied responses, although as yet have still to make a concrete decision.

After discussing the edges on my work, attention in my studio turned to their fronts. I have so far began twelve paintings. Looking at them altogether, it is clear that only a few of them are finished. While there is potential in the rest, plenty of work still needs to be done to them.

I had thought more of my paintings were finished prior to this re-evaluation. Where in the past this finding may have worried me, presently I find that I am relishing the challenge. I've got two months to get this show right and I feel that the pieces I have finished are amongst the best I have ever painted.