Aaron M Segal

In order to address some of the questions that came up about shifts in value during my midterm crit I’ve started a group of new paintings where I spend more time in the underpainting phase. This allows me to lay out the value structure of the piece before I move into color. I see this process as having less to do with rendering realistic light, and more with dramatic light used films to accentuate the drama of a scene. This painting is called Backpacking Trip.

I’ve added value to the Graceland painting, meaning I redrew a few things including the Glocks.

I’ve started a new painting called We’re Going To Graceland, after the Paul Simon song.  I like the composition in the front but I’m a little confused about the background.

So I’ve come to a stopping point on the two paintings I’ve been working on for a while.  I don’t know If they are done, there are some things in them I could see working differently, but as of now I feel like all the major issues have been addressed.

Last Friday was my midterm critique in painting (it’s not actually midterm, we just have to spread them out to fit everyone and I ended up going earlier.) To get ready for this I did a good amount of work on my second painting and added a white glove to my first. Overall the crit. went well, people were interested in what I was doing and the main suggestions were that I need to to push what I’m already doing further. Specifically I need to make color more dynamic with more extreme colors and more shifts in value, and I need to work on compositions to better mesh the figures with the ground and create more unusual situations. I agree with these issues and will work to deal with them in these paintings now, and in a groups of new works that I plan on starting over spring break, which is less then a week away.

The first print is a Dry-Point on plexiglass and and the second is a  Collograph done with the same plate.

I drew this large scale (its over six feet tall)  sumi ink piece by starting with one piece of paper and expanding as the composition required. the finished drawing has nine pieces. Also this piece was commissioned by my father.

These are etchings I’m working on in Nona’s class, they are still in early stages.

On Friday Owen suggested I look at Max Beckmann. Last year I several of his drawings and a few paintings at the MET’s show: “Glitter and Doom: German Portraits from the 1920s,” which was a collection of New Objectivist works from post WWI Germany. I have a lot to gain from all of that work both in the sardonic way it deals with issues of war and excess, and in its expressive portrayal of warped characters in warped space. Beckmann stands out, having a style that is a at once graphic and expressive. In reviewing his career I found his later work particularly interesting. His characters have exaggerated proportions and dark outlines, but at the same time they are very human and real. They dress in costume and participate in strange acts of violence. Through his character’s movements Beckmann creates compositions which are both theatrical and extremely expressive. I expect to be spending serious time studding his work.

I moved into color on my second painting yesterday and while I was a little slow getting started, now I think its looking like it has some promise.