At night

I like to paint at night, if people come to rest. I need the silence and the darkness for my concentration. At night I have the sense being alone with me and my ideas.

At night creativity, color and music are left. Everything else is reduced to itself. No noises from the street, no phone, no daylight, no cars, no shops, no dates and no work. The night allows a focus on art, everything else is invisible.

At night I hear myself better, I trust myself more than by day. It seems that the darkness will give safety, a safety which is taken from the daylight.

At night I make my own lights and shadows on paintings and in my live. Every sense is touchy: the smell of oil color, the look at shades, the felling of the canvas, the sound of music and sometimes the smell of wine.

The pleasure about the works of art is bigger at night. There’s more space for my laughter, more space for my delight, more space for wondering. No critique, no foreign ideas, only the night, art and me.

Touch me

The women I actually paint has hands! I’m so happy! Yes, I have to admit that it is difficult for me to paint hands – and feet too. This is the reason why the women on my early paintings have no hands. I tried to avoid this subject in a more or less smart way. After several trials which mainly failed, I suddenly got it.

And now I paint hands. And one can really feel that there are hands with real fingers and feet with real toes. Sometimes I even believe I could touch them and even more I feel that the hands could touch me. As if they would live and could feel themselves.

This is communication – without words.

Don’t look at me

The women I actually paint looks at me. From the first sketch, from the moment I painted her eyes, she looks at me. And the picture stands in viewing direction, if I sit on the coach to relax, if I have breakfast or if I watch TV. That’s intention, not to look at me, but to give me the chance to check the photography with the painting. I can look at her in easy-going situations.

I can define the next work stages easily. I light on the form of her face, her nose or her hands without a lot of thinking. I check the structure of the painting, the colors and the expression. I’m totally relaxed until the moment I realize, that she looks at me.

Her nose is a little bit skewed and her mouth is rubbery. But this doesn’t bother her. She holds her legs, is probably glad about her hands and feet and – she looks at me.

I can’t say the moment, when a painting has a soul. I can see it very early, maybe I imagine this. Whatever. She looks at me.

And I like to look back to her.

Shopping

I have no more Titandioxyd! Panic! How shall I produce a chalk ground coat without Titandioxyd! OK, I’ll go shopping. A decision, which makes me happy but not my wallet. I’ve learned that it’s better to write a shopping list with the products needed. It’s risky to go without I could buy too much on impulse.

Well, I write a list. I check the stock exactly, write the needs and wishes down. Then I calculate the cost. This is the moment, where my wallet yells and I need a respirator. After getting better I delete several things from the list and start the mission.

At the wholesale I can find everything what my heart desires. There are so many things I could use. There are beautiful books I could read. I should start to deal with a new form of art. Maybe sculpting. Stop, check the list! My eyes run over the colossal selection, I’m nervous like a child on Christmas. I stick by my list! But brushes are always needed. And the marble floor is few and I miss one or two color tubes from my favorite series.

At the cash point I see it’s not wise to trust myself. The next weeks I’ve to live saving money. But how shall I live without “Wurzelkrapplack” or “Ural-yellowgreen”?

Too bright – too dark

Now, every stroke has to fit, it is the last time I work on the painting. Then it must be OK.

Too bright, too bright! This color is too bright! Thus I leave it for the moment. I stand up, increase the distance and look. Then I compose another color, a second trial. This time it is too dark. Too dark! I don’t believe that sombody else can see the difference, but I can see it and this matters. So I try to calm down by walking around a little bit, getting some distance. Then again a trial. Now I succeeded, it is the proper color! I have to harmonize it with the rest of the painting. So I sit down quietly and continue my work. There is still something to do, here and there, work on a shade or add a reflex. Again stand up, go back and inspect.

Getting up, walking back, checking the painting, modifying something. Many times. Then suddenly it is finsihed. The tension relaxes. I can start to put my equipment in order. Furbishing the brushes, cleaning up the studio. And very often I have to look at the painting. Then finally the signature.

And the next days I have to refrain from additional modifications. Finished is finished!

Chaos

Generally everybody thinks that an artist always live is some sort of mess. Disorder belongs to the creative process. To some extent we think an artist keeps his environment in a bedraggled condition. In my studio this is not the case. And also in my live this is not the case. I need to keep me live in a good order, my brain and my studio as well. Of course every phase of creativity gets along with some kind of disorder. Ideas are coming out of my mind like mushrooms which are comming out of the ground and images appear in my head. There’re not enough hands to do the lot of things I want to do and the need to sleep is getting less important.

But when the amount of preparatory drawings increases, when every place on the floor is occupied by a canvas, when the place in the studio in no longer enough and the living room transforms into a studio a strong will to overcome the disorder comes up. Then I move furniture to get additional space at the walls, I put up the canvases at the wall – one closely besides the other – and I put away all the tubes of colors back to their drawer. Suddenly the danger of trip hazards are eliminated.

In this environment I can continue to work. Then again I have the necessary space to go around, to reflect and to observe. It’s an internal and external movement – an internal and external regularity.

A basis has been created

A basis has been created. In the process of painting I always come to this moment sooner or later. After applying layers of paint and after waiting until they dry a breakthrough will be reached. Already with the first layer of paint we determine the color and shape of the final creation. With the following layers shapes will be refined and the colors are getting more intensive. We cannot see much from the final product now. Again and again I apply layers of paint, changing the initial colors and the variety increases.

Then finally we can guess how the painting will look like at the end. Maybe it is just me who can see it. In any case – the direction is right. The combination of many colors, one on top of the other results in a deepness and solidity. Now it doesn’t last much longer and anybody can see what has been in my mind for a long time.

Chalk ground coat – what a feeling

The requirement is to get an even plane, a plane which feels good, if you touch it. The basis for such a plane is the chalk ground coat. The mixture of glue, water, flour of marble and Titandioxyd will be applied on the linen in thin coatings. I’ve never counted the number of the chalk coatings. For this question I trust my feeling. If it feels to rough, I’ll polish it. If there’s a hole, I’ve to apply more chalk ground coat. The combination from application, polishing and again applying finally builds up an even plane. The finishing is a last polish using a very fine sand paper. A chalky feeling stays, fine and soft like a child’s bum. The ground is absorbent like a sponge, fine like flour and white like snow.

After this my hands are rough like sand paper, my nose is clogged as with the pollen count in spring and my eyes are red – because normally it is late night when I do this.

Linen – an adventure

If you want to paint in classical technique, you have to decide which linen you want to use. Linen is available in handy sizes of 1.50 meter width x 10 meter length. Of course you can also buy sections, but it is pure luck if you get the quality you want. The assortment is large and depending on the requirement there is linen with a lot of structures or with less. There is lighter material and heavier. You can decide for ‘bright irregularities’ or for very finely woven linen. But all the same, close or fluffy processing, important is the great feeling to determine the result from the beginning.

I want … pure, fine portrait linen with very few irregularities. It would be fatal, if the women I paint would have such an irregularity in her face. So to say a pimple, at worst on an exposed position. The picture would be a dead article.