Artist’s Back to Basic – July 2019

Making a

Painting

By Phil Frankel

G

reetings fellow artists.

In Issue 2-3, I posed the

question “Is there a painting

here?” I presented my thoughts as to

why people express dissatisfaction

with their end result of copying

pictures; and why, no matter how

good it turned out, it could never

be entered in a competition, nor

sold as an original artwork.

As an example of issues arising,

that the artist must resolve, when

creating an original work, I have

written a two part article in which I

will take you through my research;

preliminary sketches; problems

faced; and influences that shaped

a painting I recently completed.

It brings together ideas I have been

discussing since I began writing these

articles. It also answers unequivocally,

the question I posed some time ago,

as to whether doing this art course has

affected my painting style and process.

Background information

In 2010 I was fortunate enough to

spend a couple of months in Africa.

I spent almost a week of that time

in Kruger National Park, and 3 or 4

days at Addo Elephant Park - taking

huge numbers of photos. The rest of

the time was spent in general sight-

seeing, visiting art galleries, meeting

people and a little bit of “R&R”.

Since then I have had a vague

idea in mind of a painting which

Teacher’s Pet