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Acrylics Anonymous, Issue #071 -- It Comes In Waves. May 02, 2018 |
Passionate about painting with acrylics? Need a monthly fix chock full of inspiration? Need some help to take the pain out of your painting process? It's all here for you. Acrylics Anonymous. Zero elitism. Dive in. If you enjoy Acrylics Anonymous, and you know someone who might also enjoy it, you can share by forwarding it to your friends! If you are receiving this because a friend has forwarded this to you, and you would like to subscribe, click here! 
Every month, we will produce a Subscribers Only "sealed section". It could be a painting technique, a short video tip, or anything we can think of that we reckon you might enjoy. Please let us know what you think, we love your feedback! To leave comments, contact us here.
Brush Play A kiwi fruit, a tomato and an avocado all reflect light differently. Spend some time playing with one paintbrush, the way you hold it, the pressure you apply, how dry or wet it is, to see how effectively you can convey these textures. You’ll be surprised how useful this can be, and you’ll find out a lot about your paintbrush! 
Mark's Latest Health Update Mark had his results back a few weeks ago from a PET and CT scan on Monday. It’s amazing news, which even surprised the oncologist! Following on from the radiation treatment he had in January, the larger tumour in one lung that was targeted is now showing only a tiny level of activity - they call it almost a complete response. The other two small tumours in the other lung are no longer active. His brain is still clear and no other melanoma metastasis were found in other organs. He will continue immunotherapy treatment for another 6 months (every 6 weeks instead of 3) and will have another PET scan then. If it is the same as this one, they won’t do any further treatment!! We are so incredibly lucky to have access to these breakthrough treatments. Thank you all so much for your continual love and support. We couldn't have got this far without you! There’s still more
of this journey, however Mark, Nic and his family (and I) are simply over the moon at this latest news :)
To read the full journey on Mark's Gofundme page, click here. Instagram Stories Look for our instagram stories at the top of your insta and facebook feeds!
Artion Galleries Are now representing Mark's work in their Cyprus and Greek galleries! Excitement. Click here for more info. 
Every month, we choose an Artist from our
forum
to showcase. You can even nominate someone if you like. (Or yourself!). To do this, check out the forum and then send us an email! It’s that easy. This month we're featuring Remo Dora's work, from Switerlnd, titled "Macchu-Picchu". Remo shares her gorgeous, expansive piece and story with us! Click here for more on Remo's work "Macchu-Picchu"
This hyperrealistic sculptor from Mexico creates extraordinarily lifelike figures. Watch Ruben Orozco's painstaking (and a bit disturbing, let's be honest) process here. You won't be able to unsee this! And now, the inspiring life story of Norman Gilbert, Glasgow artist, aged 91. His moving story is a lesson of passion, vision and spirit. Click here to be moved by Norman's work. If you have a link you like, please share it with us! You can contact us to let us know. Thank you! 
This is the section where you can "get your name in lights!" (well at least out there in the internet world!).If you have works in progress you would love to show off, or finished pieces you are particularly proud of, we would love to see them! We especially like to hear about the story behind the creation. This month's story comes from our very own Mark Waller :) From Mark: We all know I’m obsessed with waves. I quite like this one, because it was a strange angle. Part of the wave was breaking towards me, but as swells do, they bend as they go into bays. It meant I could look at the face of it, but also the back of it as it disappeared down into the bay. It was also an experiment with colour, I love that late afternoon gold, but I pushed out some of the colour in the shadows to see what I could get away with. Most of the highlights are quite yellow, so I worked with quite a bit of Dioxazine Purple and some Pthalo Blue in the shadows to give the painting a bit more “zap”. I’ve also painted it using Free Flow, which is a much more “immediate” way of painting because of the opacity and strength of colour with this product. While it’s a more “sudden death” approach to painting, it suits my impatient nature. .
As I always do, I placed everything roughly where it should be, and represented most of the tonal shifts and large areas in a way that I was happy with. I came back and bumped up all the shadows, and re-established the highlights to give the wave movement. The darker shaded pieces I did last, which is a slightly different way of going about things for me. Because I had to draw out lines, it was easier to do that and then re-establish some of the dark areas later.
I decided also very early on, to make the background matt black, to let the colours speak for themselves. Black is great backdrop to allow colour to really sing.
It’s a simple painting that was super fun to paint, and I particularly enjoyed suggesting that there’s a strong offshore breeze, pushing back up into the lip. As a surfer, it never gets boring to see the wind pushing into the face of a wave and blowing the back off it. There’s an anticipation and an experience there, that goes way beyond the painting.
Thanks so much Mark, for sharing this lovely wave with us. As you may know, Mark runs regular workshops around Australia, and classes every Thursday from his Lennox Head, NSW based studio. Follow Mark's work through his website
here.
Hope you enjoyed this issue of Acrylics Anonymous! If you have any suggestions, comments or feedback for the ezine or our site, please don't hesitate to contact us. Until next time, make sure you chuck some paint around! Cheers from Frankie & Mark :) |
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