Canvas #14: Telephone Poles, A Dragonfly, and Other Images

I have many sketchbooks and little notebooks of painting ideas that I think up often.  In the case of these “Animal, Vegetable or Mineral” paintings, the thinking up the puzzle-like process of piecing together the elements, features, or categorical states of being can easily entertain me.  Nevertheless, when I can’t find the time to actually get out my paints to develop these ideas for paintings, the ongoing compilation of composition visions can pull me into a state of over analyzing the possibilities and the what and why of the different pieces of my imagined pictures before I even pull out my brushes.  

​In my intentions for this project I made-up, that over analyzing before I even start to illustrate is not necessarily a wanted part of the creative process as I’d like to just take the ideas as they come when I actually get to the point of putting paint to canvas. That is the way I usually approach my artwork, creating as I go.  For me, the working through my paintings and then reviewing what I see and perceive in them and the feelings the process of creating may bring to light becomes the main value of the artwork as I understand it along with the appreciation of the meaningfulness of the process or the creative ‘journey’ itself.  

For this canvas #14 in my “Twenty Questions/Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral?” painting exercise, that strait spontaneity without prior preconceptions was where I came from for the art. In this new year when I found some extra time for this project, I decided to ignore all the previous ideas and layers of notes thinking of different animals and vegetables and minerals for different compositions and just go ahead and paint this model I had just come across in one of my old magazines. 

One of the reasons I decided on this model for canvas #14 is simply because I wanted to paint her curly hair.  Since I found this figure just before beginning to paint, the other elements were just filled in as I went along continuing to cover the canvas. For an animal feature, on her lifted finger I put a dragonfly because a dragonfly just randomly came to my mind at the time. Then for the mineral elements I added to the background a street of concrete lined with paint and telephone wire. A little Goggle research had me questioning what the technical classification of old tall tree trunks known as phone poles to hold telephone wire would fall under, but the grassy green field on which the poles stand and the road rolls made sure to suggest plenty in the picture that can count for what be could be classified as ‘vegetables’ in this “Animal, Vegetable and Mineral” painting project of mine.


Find an explanation about my painting exercise in the following blog:

“Is It Bigger Than A Breadbox? ‘TV Land’, ‘Saturn’, ‘December’ and ‘Parrot Wallpaper’ ”

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​Canvas #14:
Telephone Poles, A Dragonfly, and Other Images

Some process pictures in various lighting and at different stages of painting:

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