Organics Sketch 17
Acrylic on Stonehenge
7.5″ x 7.5″
©2010 Marilyn Fenn

This is one of my recent acrylic sketches exploring the structure of those organic forms in my head that I am currently fascinated to understand: in these images of interconnected solids among voids in a space of ambiguous depth, how are the parts connected; what is attached to what, and where?  I paint in order to see…

I should mention that I don’t think the color is completely accurate.  Sigh!

See more of these little sketch-paintings in my Organics Gallery.  And stay tuned for more in the not-too-distant future.

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Organics Sketch 06
Watercolor Crayons on Canvas Paper
6″ x 6″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

A little more persistence, a little more effort, and what seemed hopeless failure may turn to glorious success. — E Hubbard

The day after the opening of my solo show last October, I was thrilled to stumble on a somewhat new direction while doing some sketches, a direction that it seems I’ve been searching to find for the past few years.  Too bad this didn’t quite materialize in time for my show, but I’m sure the approximately hundred pieces of art I created last year prior to the show helped lead the way.

In these works, I’m exploring some lovely organic forms that—as far as I know—exist only in my imagination: images that consist of interconnected solids among voids in an abstract space of ambiguous depth, while other shapes float among the solid forms.

So far, I’ve only created a few small sketches in water media on paper or encaustic on wood.  I also have a few larger oil paintings in the works, and I am very excited to watch how this work unfolds and grows.

Under normal circumstances, I should have created more works along these lines since last fall, but circumstances have not been normal since just after my solo show ended.  At that time, my husband and I embarked on a house remodeling project which we still haven’t completely finished—one that turned my creative life upside down.

Now I’m back in the studio (and now I actually have one!), and the work is beginning to flow again.  So, after what seemed like an interminable interlude of the disarray of remodeling, I am once again back in my element, and optimistic about the present work and the future work to come.

In the process of making a painting in an abstract way, the painter is in search of a reality. Not one of realistic objects, but of the complete end result. The painting is experienced as a whole, and must evoke in the painter the absolute conviction that this is how it should be and no other way. — Paul Burlin

“Twisters”
Encaustic and Wood on Panel
12″ x 12″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

Creativity is about play and a kind of willingness to go with your intuition. It’s crucial to an artist. If you know where you are going and what you are going to do, why do it? — Frank Gehry

This is a very comforting quote for me.  When I paint, I frequently have only a very vague idea or sometimes — no idea at all — of what I am searching for in the new work.  I start somewhere, and often, the finished piece is so far away from where it started, it’s unrecognizable.  One of my favorite things about working this way is that I discover things — such as shapes and images — that I just couldn’t invent.

I recently watched the excellent movie called “It Might Get Loud” – a documentary on the electric guitar told through interviews and a meeting between three generations of guitar greats: Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin), The Edge (U2), and Jack White (White Stripes). I have loved the work I’ve heard by Jack White (such as the completely unabashed and fearless “Ball and a Biscuit”), but wasn’t really all that familiar with him.

He blew me away in this movie. He talked about the need to struggle in the process of creation, and if you’re not struggling, he says, do something to create a struggle. (And there were many more great quotes from him, which I’m sure will inform future posts).

Well, I definitely do struggle in my process; sometimes I’m sure it really shows; other times, you can’t even tell. It’s become far more rare for me to just breeze through a painting. (Dagnabit!)

“Jetsam-Flotsam”
Encaustic, Oil Pastel, Rice Paper and Ribbon on Panel
12″ x 12″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

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There may be several stages in the course of working on the painting where I think, “Oh, this is good.  Maybe I’m done.”  And then I do something else, and ruin what I had and have to go further to make what I’ve now got into something else good.

“Ship of Fools”
Encaustic on Panel
12″ x 12″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

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Sometimes I fear that I have lost the best stage of the work, but once I’m done, how do I know whether I did or not?  I really should document more of the transformative process.

“Emerging”
Encaustic, Rice Paper and Ribbon on Panel
9″ x12″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

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These four paintings are four of my latest struggles; one is a reworked painting from 2008; another I’ve changed since I took the photo; no promises that they won’t continue to change, including the orientation and the titles.

How about you? If you’re a creator, do you struggle to achieve your final result, or does it come easily? Is your best work the result of a struggle or not? Under what circumstances do you create your best work? Let me know in the comments below.

Tornado with Debris Cloud, version 2
Encaustic on Baltic Birch
10″ x 10″ x 2″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

I have completed two new tornado paintings; one was the one I started a few weeks ago while being interviewed for a Weather Channel segment about my tornado paintings.  It’s changed a lot since it was filmed in progress (final version above; first version below).

Tornado with Debris Cloud, version 1
Encaustic
10″ x 10″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

I really like both versions, though now the first version is available only as a Gicleé print.  I love the abstract qualities that appeared in both of these images.

The second physical painting, and third new tornado image:

Tornado Two-Step
Encaustic on Baltic Birch
10″ x 10″ x 2″
© 2010 Marilyn Fenn

I think this painting makes the tornado seem more lyrical than menacing, lightly dancing across the landscape.

Both paintings are available to purchase; check the Tornadoes Gallery on this site for more information.

Jetsons’ Holiday
Encaustic on Baltic Birch
10″ x 10″ x 1.75″ deep
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

This is the second of my Organics series using encaustic.  I have started several more in this series in oil, and will likely attempt some in acrylic, as well.  And of course, there are all the sketches.

This piece went through quite a few changes during its creation.  That’s one of the challenging things for me about encaustic.  I may think I know where I’m going when I get started on a new piece, but things have a way of getting out of control when fusing each new application of wax to a melted state again (not necessary, but I love the process and especially the glassy smooth outcome) — however, it is fraught with the danger of losing edges and shapes that one already established.

This piece has many layers to it and a very thick coat of gorgeous translucent clear beeswax. Way down almost to the very bottom layer are some lovely shapes cut out of rice paper and coated in a celadon green wax, but you can only see memories of them now. There were also several strands of “beads” of wax paint in lime green that were very carefully applied, one bead at a time, that have now blurred to a few soft, hazy lines.

And, now that I have two solid little paintings and about 8 or 9 of sketches in my new Organics series, I also have a new gallery page on which to gather them all together: Organics.

Happy Together
Encaustic and rice paper on Baltic birch
10″ x 10″ x 1.75″ deep
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Painting in Encaustic: Liberation and Challenge

For about the past year-and-a-half, I have been in a bit of despair over how to continue working in encaustic.

I started using encaustic paints in 2006. Encaustic paint is pigment suspended in a mixture of beeswax and damar resin that the artist heats and paints with while in a melted state (the paint, not the artist ) – you can read more about encaustic here.

My first attempts were simply thick coatings of clear wax covering small pastel drawings of tornadoes.  Then I began painting the tornadoes using the hot wax.  As paradoxical as it may sound, I found the demands of the encaustic medium really liberated me from my former work that was too tight or too representational for my own satisfaction.  One cannot be tight when painting in encaustic AND achieve a smooth surface, and I fell in love with the smooth surface and the unpredictability of what happens to colors melted in wax when you blow them around with hot air. For the next year or so, I was thrilled to continue working in hot wax.

I began a series of nuclear bomb paintings in encaustic, intending to paint about 100 of them, but my idea was too daunting for a subject matter that was so frightening. Having grown up in the days of duck-and-cover, I decided I couldn’t really live with that fright through the creation of 100 paintings, so I quit after completing only five nuclear bomb paintings.

I then did a political piece consisting of nine iconic images that I digitally manipulated, printed and then encased in hot wax: my “What Have We Become?” piece.  However, for most of my painting history, I have been primarily concerned with the formal qualities of art — just the beauty of the stuff on the canvas — and I always meant to avoid political statements, so this piece has (so far) stood as kind of a one-off.

Then I tried animating some encaustic paintings, but my physical set-up made that a very difficult process, so I have also put that aside for the time being.

After trying all of the above, I had a flash of inspiration and painted my set of poppy paintings (the four paintings starting with this one).  Simultaneously, I moved on to painting abstract works in encaustic.  You can see all of those pieces on my Encaustic gallery page.

In the beginning of 2008, I moved back to painting in oil again — which feels so much like home to me — and I also tried acrylic, which has now found a place in my work (when I want to work both large and fast).  But after that, I kind of hit a dead end with encaustic.  The rest of my work was becoming organic, but my next attempts at encaustic took on a design-y kind of rigid structure.  I did about 6-8 paintings like that this past summer at a workshop, and have been really unsatisfied with most of that work.  In fact, I have removed all but two of them from my Encaustic gallery page, though you can view them in the tiny thumbnail gallery below.

I’ve also tried working in ways that I see many other encaustic artists work — collaging paper and fabrics into the hot wax, scraping and carving, and embedding objects in the wax — but so far, for me, these have mostly been dismal failures.

Meanwhile, back at the easel, my latest work was taking on quite an organic shape (see the organic series on the Sketches page – now in it’s very own gallery: Organics), so I thought I’d try this imagery in encaustic as well as oil and acrylic; after three partial days of messing around with this piece, I am pretty happy with the outcome.  I’m preparing several more panels to continue my explorations in this direction.

This one, Happy Together, is just the first of my encaustic pieces for my new Organics series, and I do anticipate that I will be quite happy with subsequent pieces.  What do you think?

Chemical Valley
Oil on Canvas
5″ x 7″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn
(painting based on some crystalline concoction of various chemicals)

These little 5″x 7″ paintings are what I would call representational abstractions based on the stuff of life seen under a microscope.  I love knowing how things are made and how they look, and often I best understand how something is made by painting it.  Microphotography allows me to see the tiny things that make up the world.  These paintings are not strict copies, but are based on microphotographs of stuff like soap film, chemicals, silica and other crystals and crystalline structures.

Painting based on patterns seen in soap film:

Soap Opera
Oil on Canvas
5″ x 7″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Painting based on patterns seen in silica glass:

Nitty Gritty Glass Band
Oil on Canvas
5″ x 7″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Painting based on patterns seen in caffeine crystals:

Strung Out!
Oil on Canvas
5″ x 7″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Coming Right at Ya
Mixed Media on Watercolor Paper
9″ x 12″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Ta-da!!!  More rocks. 

The ~65th small work of 2009.

Rocks and Flowers
Mixed Media on Watercolor Paper
12″ x 9″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn

Every now and then, a landscape sneaks out, even though my aim is non-representational work. Whaddya gonna do?

Circuits
Mixed Media on Watercolor Paper
12″ x 9″
© 2009 Marilyn Fenn