Paintings

Suddenly it took of

A short story about why you can look at this site now

At work we about once yearly attend at a seminar. Besides lots of buzzwords and decent food such seminars typically include some kind of team building exercise. Some years you are milling around in groups solving tasks, other years it has been some creative activity. To me the worst year was, where we were supposed to mill around and solve tasks and each task station was manned by a “coach” (probably just a poor student from a teachers college needing beer tokens) in orange fleece, really outdoorsy, speaking to you like you were a dog being trained. The only team building in that, I could and can see, was building the common hatred to the situation in general and the orange dog trainers, sorry, coaches in particular. I digress. (cont…)

Frontier Psychiatry #2

Much to my amazement a colleague asked me whether I could paint a brain for her having seen what I painted on a seminar.

Title of this series is inspired by this

🔴 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Another year (the following?) we could choose which activity to participate in, one of them was painting. We were put into groups given a few tubes of paint and a canvas and simply told: “Paint a brain!”. And then we were left on our own. I still cannot help but wonder if it mostly was an option mainly created to avoid the moaning and groaning from those of us who were less than keen on milling round in a forest solving tasks. (cont…)

Heart of Gold #2

I was asked: Can you paint anything else but brains? And use some lively colours? I like orange, pink and gold, but I am not so keen on blue, can you do that? Ending the salvo with, if I like it I’ll buy it. To that I could answer, that yes I do paint other thing than brains, but brains appears to be in demand. The colours, well, I could give it a try. I had to sneak some light blue, because I needed some contrast to all the red tones. I sold the painting to the challenger.

The picture to the left is second try on this motive. The first has very similar colours, but I have evolved my techniques. This picture was commissioned by D for his wife at their 15th anniversary.

Yes, the title comes from this one.

🔴 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Well, we settled in our group. There I mentioned that I did paint as a hobby and I had noticed that what often was missing in team building paintings was a background in the picture. So put myself forward to paint a quick background, and so we all could get on with the foreground. The other members of the group agreed and I made a fast background. And much to my astonishment they were extremely delighted. To me it was a background that was bit darker than I’d preferred, but time constraints, suboptimal working light, and a brand of paint I was unfamiliar with. To me it was ok. (cont…)

Heart of Gold #3

This was not what I intended, the intention was a background for “Nannas Hjerne”, also shown on this page. I wasn’t bold enough with the colours for that purpose. But despite that I am still satisfied with the result, and decided it was a work in its own right.

⚪ 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

When the background was done the rest of the group insisted that I should just continue with the foreground on my own. Knowing that doing exactly that would on one hand completely defy the idea of teamwork, but on the other hand I was drawn by the possibility to let my creativity loose. So in the end I reluctantly carried on. That is, I was reluctant until I got started painting, because then I only care about the canvas in front of me. (cont…)

Frontier Psychiatry #3

Another colleague also came forward and asked whether I could paint a brain for him. Well, of course, I could as long as haven’t made the perfect imperfection I will try to improve. This time round the brain should be blue.

Because I would like to play around with some techniqes and I wasn’t sure about the colours of the foreground I decided to make two blue brains. The one you can see is the one he didn’t acquire.

⚪ 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Little did I know that the reception I got in my painting group was insignificant compared to what happened when the paintings were presented for the all the seminar participants. I felt outed, I have no better way of describing it. I had not imagined what change a painting could do. There was an immediate change in whom came and talked to me. Among those who came over and talked are some I consider key to me daring displaying my art, because they have continued to nudge me. At time, in the setting they were strangers, who appeared to genuinely appreciate what I had made. It was great and scary at the same time. To me, all what had happened was that I had been left unattended with a canvas and some paint and I had had fun putting some of the paint onto the canvas. During the evening I was not able to just sit in the corner and introvertly observe the world as I use to, it was overwhelming suddenly to be part of it.

And some people even asked for a website where they could see more of what I had made. In my mind I was (am) just painting to preserve what is left of my sanity. That was when the first seeds for this website was sown.

Nannas Hjerne (Frontier Psychiatry #5)

[Nanna's Brain (Frontier Psychiatry #5)]

My friend, Nanna, said to me “You are the only one who can paint my brain. Can you make it for my 40th birthday?”

I gave it a try, and here it is. With her the colours couldn’t be dull. A good occasion to challenge my palette. One can easy become a creature of habits when choosing colours.

She claims it is right, I’d say, that if anything, the colours aren’t vibrant enough. She is one of those persons who makes it hard for me to remain suitably grumpy. I am tempted to try a take two on this.

🔴 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

My tools

Just to name some: Brushes, spatulas, sticks, credit cards, corks, paper, wrinkled fabric, cutlery, sponges – And some added despair, desperation and madness. Oh, and I forgot – Masking tape.

A photo of some of my tools will be inserted here.

Vrede

[Anger]

One day at work I was truly hacked off by a manager, I should note, not any of my own managers. When I came home I remained very upset over the excellent display of arrogance my colleagues and I had been subject to. I grabbed a canvas poured some paint on a piece of cardboard as my usual makeshift palette. In short time this was the result and I was in a considerably better mood. And it is probably not the worst way of handling such a situation.

⚪ 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Ice

⚪ 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Seascape

⚪ 80 cm x 80 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Inspiration

Some ask me where I get my ideas from. From nowhere and everywhere – Sometimes I start with a word or a statement. You may ask, but where does that comes from then? Well, again everywhere and nowhere – Talks with friends, overheard conversations, threads of thought, dreams. And occasionally I bring that the word or sentence completely out of context. At other times I just start with some paint and see where I end.

Other ask me how I get the ideas – I can only counter-ask. You don’t get them? It’s not arrogance, it’s just a never resting brain.

Unfortunately there seem to be a tendency to that I work best under time pressure. Maybe not the best trait when you are prone to stress. But it appears that some of my most inspired periods are when I am supposed to deliver a work. That sounds good on the surface, but the ideas are for other works, or for reworking the current work so much that I can’t finish it in time.

Synesthestic Sudoku #2

Synesthesia is when the brain routes sensory information through multiple unrelated senses, causing you to experience more than one sense simultaneously, according Google. My firend H told me a late night that he as a kid experienced synesthesia, such that numbers had colours, though only the numbers 1-6. Despite that minor detail my brain saw a sudoku.

More sudokus are under way, I somehow like the idea, that you can solve my painting, but not in a way that an art or literature teacher would like you to.

🔴 50 cm x 50 cm; Acrylic on canvas

Solnedgang

[Sunset]

🔴 ca 42 cm x 39 cm; Acrylic on packaging paper

Outside in 1 of 2

Early work playing with techniques. Unfortunately it is a little bit scratched due to being kept in the big moving box

30 cm x 46 cm; Acrylic on cardboard mounted on fiberboard

Inside out 2 of 2

Early work playing with techniques. Unfortunately it is a little bit scratched due to being kept in the big moving box

30 cm x 46 cm; Acrylic on cardboard mounted on fiberboard

Forced Creativity 8/8

During the pandemic we all ordered things online. Boxes with various stuff arrived. But rather than bringing the boxes down to the recycling container I butchered them. I got a load of free canvases. The sizes were a bit odd for a canvas, but that didsn’t bother me and still doesn’t.

This and the following pictures are from a series of 8 pictures are made from such a box. I made them because my shrink told me that I had to do something creative and present it at the next session, thus the title.

I don’t have decent photos of some of them because my friends acquired them before I thought about taking photos. I was still just painting for the shelves.

19 cm x 37 cm; Acrylic on cardboard, mounted on fiberboard