Not Flowers II

Not Flowers II

36 x 24"

acrylic on canvas

© Nicki Ault, 2014

HaPpY NeW yEaR!!!

The last painting of 2014 ends up being another possible option for my little bathroom. This was so much fun to paint. Dripping, spraying, wiping, scrubbing, dabbing- basically lots of playing with no concern with things going right or "turning out". In the end I do think I like it. It has some impact in person. So now I have a decision to make. Which one goes in my house?

 Not Flowers

36 x 24"

acrylic on canvas

© Nicki Ault, 2014

Orchids

Orchids
(work in progress) 

16 x 20"

acrylic on board

© Nicki Ault, 2014

Let me just get something off my chest... painting abstracts is hard! I mean HARD. Especially working straight out of your head. Not easy. What do you even paint? It literally could be anything! How do you even know what colour to use? You don't! There are no answers, just questions. You start making marks, but then they don't look good so you cover them up and make different marks, but then they don't look good so you cover them up and make different marks, but then they don't look good so you cover them up. You see my troubles. So then you get to the point where you say to yourself, "Okay, this is it, I'm going to put an awesome colour/mark here." But then you think it could wreck everything, so you don't. Then you say to yourself, "On the other hand I will never know unless I try, so here goes...." And then you do it and everything is wrecked, so you put a bunch of gesso over it and start the process again.

Basically the above painting is my most recent experiment. I don't know, I am at a stand-still. It's a quirky little deal and for some odd reason it makes me think of orchids. It makes my son think of a chicken lady wearing an outfit. Whatever. Funny thing is that it has pretty well turned out to be the colour palette of my new renos... turquoise/teal, orange/paprika, black and white. It needs more work- something, anything. Or maybe just another coat of gesso! My indecision is a problem. So I am putting it "out there"- ready or not. There may as well be more of us pondering the difficulty of abstract painting.

Glow

Glow

40 x 30"

acrylic and oil on canvas

© Nicki Ault, 2013
sold

I just returned home from a much needed evening out with some friends. Spending time with these girls is like therapy and we need to make it happen more often. With my spirit intact I feel good enough to share an abstract I have been puttering around with at the studio. As I have mentioned in the past, abstracts are way outside of my comfort zone, but I am intrigued and challenged by them and I love when I come across an abstract work that moves me in some way. My blogger friend, Kim Rempel, is a landscape painter who has officially delved into abstract painting full force and she is banging out some beauties. I am so proud of her for her courage and determination to push her artistic self in this way, to face the unknown and uncomfortable and work through it. You can check out her work if you go to her blog Eat Drink Paint. I strongly encourage you to take the time.

The painting I am showing you today is an extension of the 1-2-3 exercise from my class at the Emma Lake Kenderdine Campus last summer where you create a painting, then from that one you take a favorite section and do another painting, then you repeat that same process. You can keep going on like that with each painting becoming more abstract. Glow came from a section of an abstract branch painting I did at that class. I really wanted to focus on the lines of the branches, but simplify the composition by selecting which ones to remove, leaving others in place to create interesting shapes and areas. Another thing I wanted to do was use colour to create a feeling of a glow behind the branches... almost like light coming through a stained glass window. Unfortunately the glow or slightly vibrating colour does not come through well on the computer screen. I have had this painting at my house for the last week and at night, in a dimly lit room, the bright areas actually do seem to emit a soft glow. It is a cool effect I hadn't anticipated.

Winter Through The Dogwood

Winter Through The Dogwood

36 x 24"

acrylic and oil on canvas

© Nicki Ault, 2012
sold

Yesterday I hung a new solo show called "Lines and Colours"- a collection of my abstract work at a beautiful, new Chiropractor Clinic in town, Circle Chiropractic. I feel a bit nervous because putting my non-comfort-zone work out there is a bit of a stretch. Some of the work is from the abstract class I took in the summer and the rest of the show is filled out with other abstract reflections and a couple of abstracted landscapes. My friend, artist Bridget Aitken (from the studio where I paint), came to help me hang the work. She is so good at it and has more experience than me, so I always feel I learn something when she is around. 

I was happy with how the show looked when we left; pieces are displayed in the waiting room, hallway and examination/massage therapy rooms. I hope that the energy of these paintings somehow adds to the healing work that is done at this clinic. Obviously most people visiting this place are in discomfort or pain and I hope that as they wait for their appointment they can get lost in the marks, lines and colours of my paintings and maybe forget about their troubles for awhile.

The above painting was just completed, and was still a little wet when it was hung! Using an exercise from the abstract class, I took a section of another painting "Dogwood Arrangement" and enlarged it to make a new composition, then I played! There are some subtle marks and areas I am in love with...

Have a wonderful weekend and Happy Thanksgiving to all of my Canadian friends!

Dogwood Trio

Confusion

Reach Out

Surround Me

each 10 x 10"

acrylic and oil on canvas

© Nicki Ault, 2012

sold 

If I may say, these paintings make me happy! I had hoped they would sell as a group and, in fact, they did. I am thrilled they are hanging together in a very happy home and I am sure that if I wanted I could even go visit them!

I am so excited about the class I am taking in August at the Emma Lake Kenderdine Campus. I am intrigued by abstract art (well, some abstract art) so this class called "Abstract Expressionism in Painting" should offer a good opportunity to learn and explore. I really want to play with my abstract reflections again and also elaborate on this abstract branch idea. There are not enough hours in the day! Sheesh! And I still want to experiment with portrait painting someday!!!

When I was working on these three pieces I spent time thinking about the different branches and the stories they might tell. I got thinking about my own life about a year ago when I was extremely stressed by several scenarios in my life. I lost weight, I had trouble sleeping, I was near tears 24-7 and I didn't ever want to be alone. Whew. It was a rough patch and it felt like it would never end. But it did. Now looking back I see the story and what got me through. Various things that were happening had me very confused. I felt like the branches in the first painting- my emotions were all over the map: overlapping, tugging, pulling, tangling and intertwining with each other. It was a lot of "Confusion". It didn't take me long to realize that I couldn't handle all these difficult scenarios by myself, so I had to "Reach Out" to family, friends and, in one case, the authorities!!! And finally once I had this layer of insulation in place I felt a bit of relief. Thank goodness I had people to call on to "Surround Me".