In the works..
The back is 
key--It must show tension and strength without being over-defined or "muscly". The back must portray the emotion, give as strong a visual cue as the face...so the hair is short. In combination with the passive hand, the message is mixed. I'm still working the nuances. Then, back to the herons...
The subject is Eve. I didn't know it when I started the painting. It was just some odd idea of a nude woman surrounded by herons. I liked the ambiguity. It was a little too ambiguous - so I set it aside for awhile. During its quiet time, I finished many other paintings, including "Exiting Eden". The man's back faces us, shoulders rounded, as if he just heaved a heavy sigh, or got the wind knocked out of him. The emotion is in the posture. I didn't know it was Adam until I had to give it a title.
The seed for this painting is a little note I wrote many years ago... "Where does a good man go in the face of a gathering storm?"..but I don't feel like going into that when someone asks what the painting's about.. Both painting and note work well with the biblical themes. I like to think the Bible's first couple were good people. Good people make crummy decisions sometimes...sometimes it happens when they think they're trying their hardest.
"Exiting Eden" brings me back to the Girl with Herons with a new understanding of the dynamics of the image. She cannot be languid, the birds too romantic. The posture is the expression of a greater story... Almost the opposite of the "saint" series, which are all about the serene face.
key--It must show tension and strength without being over-defined or "muscly". The back must portray the emotion, give as strong a visual cue as the face...so the hair is short. In combination with the passive hand, the message is mixed. I'm still working the nuances. Then, back to the herons... The subject is Eve. I didn't know it when I started the painting. It was just some odd idea of a nude woman surrounded by herons. I liked the ambiguity. It was a little too ambiguous - so I set it aside for awhile. During its quiet time, I finished many other paintings, including "Exiting Eden". The man's back faces us, shoulders rounded, as if he just heaved a heavy sigh, or got the wind knocked out of him. The emotion is in the posture. I didn't know it was Adam until I had to give it a title.
The seed for this painting is a little note I wrote many years ago... "Where does a good man go in the face of a gathering storm?"..but I don't feel like going into that when someone asks what the painting's about.. Both painting and note work well with the biblical themes. I like to think the Bible's first couple were good people. Good people make crummy decisions sometimes...sometimes it happens when they think they're trying their hardest.
"Exiting Eden" brings me back to the Girl with Herons with a new understanding of the dynamics of the image. She cannot be languid, the birds too romantic. The posture is the expression of a greater story... Almost the opposite of the "saint" series, which are all about the serene face.