The yellow bird; the fox; bestiary

The yellow bird, oil on card, 17.5 x 12.5 cm

Alas I suppose there is some of Picasso (not my favorite painter by any means) in this: I love painting animals, so did he,but my regular landscape work doesn`t often accommodate this. So I will paint things like this from time to time. 

I recall a children`s book called The Painted Bird (perhaps I misremeber the title?) beautifully illustrated about a painter and how a bird he painted comes to life. I`m not referring to the 1965 novel by Jerzy Kosiński.

 The fox, oil on card, 16 x 11 cm

These two are the first in a bestiary, which I hope you enjoy.

The Guardians of the Moth- in conference.

They meet at night, in whispers conferring. What are they planning? No wickedness I trust...

Different media allow such different responses in artists- Picasso is perhaps the best example for this- the Picasso of cereamics being a different personality from the Picasso of paint.

Myself, I find that paper cutout, which only really allows mimetic effects through silhouettes, forces a degree of abstraction on me. And the cutting process, so absolute, allows no equivocation: oil paint by contrast can endlessly, hopelessly ponderous.

With cutout, I find myself more engaged with humour and storytelling, and drawn into communion with artists such as Richard Dadd, or Henry Darger and (less nutty) Maurice Sendak. There are some imaginative forces that are only ever released in play, and using a medium like paper cutout which has relatively little historical weight, allows me to play more freely. And the cutouts can be moved about like dolls to make different scentarios. This is, of course, delightful.