A New Wave
I tear down the plastic wrap on the 6” blank canvas that stands before me.
A step back, a pounding heart and a deep breath.
I throw in my headphones and start shaking my can of spray paint.
Session 1: A Beach Day in Porto
Though I know a picture wouldn’t do it justice I wish I took more photos this day. The waves crashing into me, washing me of everything. Over the hiss of the waves I can hear Ruth laughing, through the walls of ocean I spy her brown skin contrasted to the champagne supernova of colours around us. The ocean and sky had no divide, they melted and mixed together like nothing I could ever properly explain. Completely surrendered to the ocean I felt the most beautiful pale pinks and blues wash over me.
Pure bliss, the clouds were shining but the sun was nowhere to be found. My heart felt lifted and I knew exactly that this moment and this feeling could only be recreated through painting.
Top and bottom, my mind split the canvas in two, a sky and soon to be sea will mesh my favoured abstract style with the realism I aim to blend and incorporate in my paintings as well. Sky blue fills my mind with Porto memories and the Canadian summer sun keeps me warm in my creating.
Clouds filled my head and the canvas as well.
Session 2: Its not always fun
Another stance before a canvas split in two. I stand here for quite some time, staring at this line that divides. Reflecting on myself, the past few weeks being back to the real world, caught up in the chaos of getting all my plans underway. I started playing with reflection, daydreaming of hopping over and through sea rock and searching through tide pools in Cadiz, Spain. A day filled with laughter and adventure, a memory that brings rock like geometries to my mind. The blues in the water that day were so pure and full of life. Doing my best to blur out the chaos of life and channel old memories, I let my hands and mind begin.
I started my second session using my abstract methods and got messy with adding mirror material and pouring in my colours. One of my favourite parts of this painting method is zoning in on all the tiny fine details, I lose myself in them.
After a long session of adding different patches of meticulous detail, I was frustrated. The painting seemed completely divided in two. I wanted so badly to make the two styles blend more comfortably and I didn’t feel even close to reaching that goal. This frustration turned into self doubt quite quickly and all of a sudden I just stood up and lifted the left side of the canvas.
Almost as a slow motion ‘flipping the table’ move, I watched everything I had just worked on flow down off the canvas onto the floor. My creative process isn’t always fun, and it is not always rewarding.
I treated the canvas almost as a punching bag at this point in my session, dragging brush over and over letting the paint run and letting myself just be frustrated.
The shed was just about flooded with blue paint and I was covered head to toe.
“Its time to stop” I remember saying out loud, I felt like the canvas and I just fought and both of us ended up blue and tired. I scrubbed off the session and let the canvas have some alone time for a few days before looking at it with more loving eyes.
Session 3: Letting Go
It took me about a week to open the shed doors again. I felt defeated and really conflicted with how I was going to get back on track with my vision. Reoccurring thoughts of ditching the whole idea faded in and out and I came to realize that when I push too hard I can’t get anywhere. I came to accept that I won’t get to my vision right away, or maybe not at all. This both terrified and eased my mind in weird ways. Flowing in and out whenever I passed by the shed going to and from work. The routine between those thoughts and my day to day felt like a ticking bomb and I knew the only way to stop it was to face my project and get a better perspective on things.
I came back to my fundamentals;
“What is my goal in this?”
“Why”
“What feels right?”
“Does this make me happy?”
I answered these questions and many others that I found hiding in my head. I figured out that the best way to get where I wanted to, was to let go. Let go of the strict image I had in my head of myself creating this painting and the expectation to recreate everything so perfectly. Stay present when painting, only briefly diving into my memories rather than anticipate my future. Falling back into a merge of the blues I felt on my trip. A merge of sea and sky. Recreating a feeling, a motion, that is my goal. Getting there is just part of it. Letting go is all it would take for me to truly give this canvas the proper love and meaning it deserves.
A cloudy grey Sunday and I was finally letting go.
A huge thank you to Nick Richard for helping me capture my process in these past two sessions, he has a great eye for capturing artists of any kind and was a joy to have around. Find more of his shots here
Session 4: Momentum
It felt so good to be back in my groove. What was so recently a stress became an obsession and I was in my little studio over 8 hours a week. Each time focused on a different kind of tiny detail I wanted to add to the canvas. An extra shine, outline, enhancement, every time working on my skills and my process. A new wave of creativity washing over me just like the ocean on that beach day in Portugal. I surrendered and became consumed by the colours in my mind.
A compilation of the many sessions that brought new love to my 6 ft friend.
Session 5: A New Wave
Sitting and writing this journal has helped me through the process of finishing this painting. The hardest part is knowing when it’s done. I took the painting inside, looking at it from all different angles and in different settings. This proved to be quite difficult considering the size of it, none the less I got new perceptions that helped me understand the painting in a different light. I find new meaning and memories every time I look at the painting and it makes me feel empowered to keep pushing myself with my style of creation. Everyone will take their own understandings from it and maybe not everyone will enjoy it but thats what art is. Pushing perspectives and invoking feeling is what I hope this painting will achieve in its viewers. All I can give is my process and my own perspective, that is, every time I stand in front of it I feel the ocean and sky like I did this summer.
A New Wave - Acrylic on Canvas by MvB | Sept-Nov 2019
If you’re interested in hearing some of the music that kept my creative sessions flowing you can find it here!