4x6 ft.

Oil on canvas.

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The painting:

My painting professor based the composition of our second semester final on a Degas entitled "Interior." Though my class was not made aware of the inspired source of our final project until towards the end, the positioning of the figures raised a lot of questions. Why does the woman turn away? Why does the man watch her while standing with his back against the wall? What is the nature of their relationship? 

 

The window: 

For me, the canvas was obnoxiously long, so I had to decide between having a more expansive, horizontal scene or a potentially narrow vertical window. I opted for the latter, accentuating the discomfort and claustrophobia of the piece. I wanted the verticality to create drama, as if the viewer is forced to gaze through a slitted window, peeking into a private and peculiar space.The set up's coloration was heavy in ochre tones, and I chose not to deny the suffocating presence of this color, letting it dominate the canvas. This quality of bordering on "too much" characterizes much of this piece for me in every sense of the word, from the canvas threatening to crop the woman's face and closely framing the man's body to the drastic incline of the carpet. 

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The palette knife:

ART 202-203 saw my transition into using palette knife almost exclusively. I found that once I stopped using brushes, I was able to fixate less on detail, and my work developed a more sculptural quality. I approached the holistic work with more deliberation and chose to let parts of the canvas show through even in the final product which I never would have done in high school. With this, I challenge the idea of "finishedness" and quality.

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