Oil painting by Elaine Ask 1991
Hartshead, Liversedge, West Yorkshire, UK
Elaine Ask UK Oil Paintings in 1990’s
Oil painting by Elaine Ask 1991
Hartshead, Liversedge, West Yorkshire, UK
Tag: oil on canvass
Oil painting by Elaine Ask 1991
Hartshead, Liversedge, West Yorkshire, UK
Oil painting by Elaine Ask in Nottingham
Oil on Canvass 410 x 410 mm May 2011
This garden is in Washdyke Lane, Hucknall, Nottingham. The owner, who sadly has since passed away, was holding an artists’ get together . We were encouraged to be productive so I brought along my oil paints, and this smallish square canvass and set up my easel in his garden. Fortunately it didn’t rain and it was warm enough to be comfortable standing outside all afternoon. I was forced to think carefully about what to leave out in order to make this painting work , using only his garden as the subject. The bench, the garage and a few flowers were enough to create what you see here.
Oil Painting Every-Day Life Scenes
Framed Oil on Canvass
1994
This is a homely domestic scene. The teenager has an almost vacant, look, as she sits watching TV, and certainly doesn’t appear to be that happy. You can’t see what she is thinking, as she is wrapped up in her own little world. Its evening time, and in the top left hand corner of the painting, adjacent to a small plant, the little lamp on top of the wooden desk casts reflected colours onto the desk itself and the wall to the right, on which a painting of a child playing the violin hangs. The armchair on which she sits has a yellow cellular blanket draped over it, while the second armchair next to her is adorned with colourful cushions. On the far left is a patterned carpet/rug.
So many colours and patterns, yet somehow they all hang together!
Oil on Canvass 1984
610 x 457 mm
Another painting from life , created ten years earlier than the one shown above, depicts Greek villagers going about their business in the summer of 1984
Painting from life is not like a photograph
A photo is a moment in time, the shutter clicked to capture a subject that excites visually or emotionally, or it can simply be a notebook to record facts and ideas. Just as in photography, the choice of a subject for a painting can be made in a flash, or it can require slowly made decisions to choose that moment when the lighting is right and it all comes together. Before starting this painting, I walked all round the area, taking photos of potential subjects, then painted it on the spot, spread over two evenings, not finishing till almost nightfall. Below are some of the photos I took before choosing the painting that would emerge. The first three photos show what I did not choose to paint – but did consider – as they didn’t suit the size and proportions of my canvass, and it the case of the first photo, would work much better in graphic media, rather than oils.
“The Wall ” 700x 500 mm 2019 -Aegina.
Chance Encounters, Music and Art
When my younger daughter was 6 years old she wanted to learn the violin. I had also wanted to learn to play it and was actually offered a chance to have free lessons in my junior school, but my Dad wouldn’t let me. He filled a few old glass milk bottles with water, tapped them and asked me which was higher and which was lower. His scientific conclusion was that I would be rubbish! So a few decades later, I was very happy to take my daughter to violin lessons with a fascinating Polish nonagenarian gentleman called Mr. Szistowski in Bradford. His house was like a museum, full of violins, and the toilet upstairs, accessed via a grand wooden staircase, had a huge wide wooden toilet seat nearly a meter wide!
We ended up sharing the 45 minute lesson, so I could learn to help my daughter practice. Then we started going to Cleckheaton Music Centre together, and I joined in too, along with all the other young children. Then one day we performed in a concert along with children from other schools in what was then the McAlpine Stadium, and I met another mother who also played the violin and viola (by then I was also playing the viola) , while her two sons, played the the cello and double bass. A few years later, I photographed her sons playing their Instruments in a room with sunlight streaming through the vertical blinds.
The boy’s mother loved it so much, she decided to commission a painting from me. No price was discussed, but she paid a hundred pounds deposit and waited for her painting. It was a very long wait, but she never gave up hope. Years passed, and I even photographed the older one’s wedding!
“The Young Musicians” 2019
1000 x 800 mm – Oil on Canvass
When the magic happens…
I was walking back from shopping in Aegina town, having bought a microwave, kettle and two ring electric table top cooker – a surprise gift for my Airbnb hosts, when I decided to explore another path back to my Airbnb “home”. It took longer than I thought it would, so I tried to follow a little path through an orchard, as the shop would be delivering my purchases after they shut for midday. The path lead to a house so it was either a case of turning back and being super late , or cutting through their garden (naughty!). I reckoned as it was Greek midday quiet time, that they would all be sleeping, so decided to risk it . I ended up in a little dirt road , and there on the corner was the YELLOW HOUSE! I could immediately see the painting in my mind, but just hoped the light would still be in the right direction by the time I got back again later.
Ελαιογραφία “Το Κίτρινο Σπίτι”
2019
Αίγινα
Painting from life through my eyes.
Oil on Canvass
700 x 500 cm
Aegina, Greece
“Εκφραστικές Γραμμές”
Αίγινα 2019
A painting starts with my eyes, as I choose the spot that will work in this size of canvass and light falling on the image. This choice of subject could come immediately , almost by magic, or after a few hour’s walk round the area, searching.
I add a turps-thinned oil-paint-wash to cover the stark white of the canvass, usually in a shade of blue, then while it is drying I lay out the palette with my paints – three or four of each colour reds, blues, yellows and several larger blobs of white. (Never any black or muddy tones of brown, , ochre, or mixable colours like green or orange). Then I sketch out the composition, either in charcoal or ultramarine thinned with turps: the lines and swirls that define the shapes and emotions of the subject. The limited palette and tinted background helps to balance the colours together in harmony, while each mark is deliberate and carefully planned.
