With all the melting and refreezing, it’s a strange winter. The ice pond continues to fascinate me, however, with its always changing patterns and configurations. Who would guess that a little bit of grass, mud, water and ice could be so intriguing?
I always start with an idea, but after the first or second day of work, the painting often flies off in a new direction. When I started Finding the Poetry in Winter, I was aiming for something minimal based on walks at my pond this December, something as subtle as some of Brian Eno’s soundscapes and taking advantage of chance (as John Cage so wisely mastered).
As the work developed, I saw more and more potential for merging painting and drawing. Using a darker, thick ebony pencil I could make a dark line and score through the wet paint, leaving ridges to catch subsequent rolls of thin color. Painted and rolled lines offered wonderful contrast. To keep the lines from being too intentional, I rolled transparent neutral gray tones over the wet lines. The roller smudged and “repeated” the lines in a way I couldn’t predict. The more I layered pencil and paint strokes with rolled glazes, the richer the surface became. As the days of work progressed, the surfaces became more varied and the palimpsests more evocative. I especially like the way this new way of working lets my thought process show through.
Details from the finished painting below, followed by views of the painting in progress.
Daily progress
Despite the bold start, after many glazes, spatter, and rerolls, the image almost disappeared. However, I liked the pencil strokes and ghosts, and the feel of the piece. A little more drama wouldn’t hurt, however. I increased the contrast again, and added more of the roller and pencil drawing.
Day five brought much more drawing after rolling semi-transparent glazes over much of the painting to lighten the mood. It was a day of learning what drawing then over-rolling could do.
By day six, I knew a lot more about drawing with the roller and with pencil, interweaving the direct work with over-rolls of nearly transparent grays. Fun, and wintry, but still not enough surface interest. There is so much that I observe at the pond, and this felt too much like one moment, rather than a summation of all that I had observed during this snowless December/January.
Approaching the woods, it’s all about anticipation, wondering what I will find. Sometimes a lovely patch of mature woods, other times the tangled, exuberant growth and broken branches of edges, or the relics of past use. All are fabulous subjects for inspiration, an anchor point for starting a painting. In this case, the colors are wintery with notes of ochre, Mars violet, ultramarine blue, and burnt umber mixed or glazed to form warm/cool intersections. The dark, rolled base and textures show through subsequent layers, adding interest and depth. On another level, learning to follow my instincts and take advantage of the accidents and “mis-takes” gives me more confidence to follow the mysteries out there. More details below. Enjoy.
Technical painting notes: With a bold and unexpected start my priority was keeping as much of the original layer as possible, while bringing in more hints of color and depth. I used translucent grays over colored glazes to soften and recede some areas. I pulled up some of the whites in the scraped parts to reinforce their prominence. I used a roller with various gray mixtures to push some areas further back, soften edges, and for the accidents that always happen. The edge of the roller is great for drawing fine lines.
It is always a variation on a theme, this return to spring at my pond in the woods. I think I know the place, but winter changes it. The same happens with the panel and the idea. I think I know the subject and how to start the painting, but then the painting takes off in a different direction as I follow an impulse or take advantage of an accident. In the end it is still about the place, but more. Details below. Enjoy.
Technical painting note: The beginnings of a new beaver lodge in the upper left were a challenge. I painted the intertwined branches compulsively, and though it was exactly what I saw, it didn’t work with the rest of the painting. Eventually, I took a roller full of gray paint and interrupted the branches, then rolled in some green too. Now it felt like it belonged without calling too much attention to itself. Apology: I regret that I couldn’t get a jpg that showed the range of the greens in the painting, but that is the digital dilemma.
There’s a poetry that I hope to achieve in all my paintings – a sense of mystery and the tension between what can be described and what can only be felt. Drifting Past November was slow to evolve. It’s based on late fall by the creek, with reflections from over-hanging branches and a few leaves floating by. I brought the painting to near completion but didn’t know how to finish it. The “place” was described, but the delicate feeling where loss and beauty intersect was missing. Living with it on the wall of the studio for a couple years gave my thinking time to evolve. No longer fearing a “mistake” I added layers of red gesture drawing based on the overhanging leaves and heightened the lights. The combination of more layered glazes and brushed and rolled detail work increased the complexity and added to the sense of depth, as well as making the color more exciting. I emphasized the contrast of hard and soft edges as a metaphor for what is present and what is disappearing. Details below, along with the version that hung on the wall for two years.
There’s a gentleness to late spring and early summer, and a quiet harmony of color, especially in the greens. The Green Voice of Summer explores some of the close harmonies of the season with a somewhat abstract view of my favorite pond and its reflections. Unlike many of my autumn pondscapes, this painting whispers its mood and message. You have to stop to hear it, as did I last July when the idea began to form in my imagination. Details below. Enjoy.
One never knows how a painting will evolve. The inspiration for this painting came while I was sitting in a parking lot during a sudden spring shower and looking out through a drippy windshield. I liked it so much I started photographing through the windshield. The blurry effect of the gray tones and springy yellow greens really sang. Later, in the studio, I painted No Rain Yet, which you can see below.
No Rain Yet eventually went to a gallery just before the pandemic started. Nearly three years later, I asked for it to be returned – I loved the painting, but with three more years of experience I could see a way to bring the painting farther. The gallery graciously said fine. Looking, I began to see garden forms and a way to bring in some detail and more depth. What fun. I retitled the painting Notes from the Garden – No Rain Yet to honor the original and the new. Details below. Enjoy.
Water, that elusive substance that changes form so mysteriously. 32 Degrees is about the time in autumn when temperatures keep hovering around the freezing point. As you watch the pond’s surface you can see the film of ice grow, though when it is thin enough it still behaves more like a fluid, even bending with the wind’s ripples. Sometimes there are strips of thin ice interwoven with open water, and you have to wonder how and why? Not only is it strangely mysterious, it is also incredibly beautiful. In October, with warm colors still around, the pondly reflections and crystalline surfaces become magical. Who could not be inspired? Details below. Enjoy.
Technical painting notes: Knowing that this painting would be about thin ice overlaying a pond with reflections, I started with a bold underpainitng, using blackish browns to strongly indicate the major tree trunk reflections and massing branches. I wanted lots of texture to suggest leaves and debris in the reflections, so I manipulated the wet paint with my silicone scraper and drips of solvent. I used a narrow roller to draw some of the branches. With a solid lay-in, I let the paint dry. Coming back later, I glazed color onto the panel and started painting the negative spaces of the sky, working intuitively to create interesting patterns. Modelling the major branches with highlights, and using a 1/4″ roller to add more branches, provided the density of tangle I wanted. When this layer was dry, I used fairly transparent gray-blue or warm gray rolled glazes to control the ice film, then went back and color corrected some areas, adjusting values in other areas.
Teri Malo Studio 