Abstraction: Layering

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I’ve designed myself a ten step programme to move from Representational art into a personal language of Abstraction. To understand what I mean by that, be sure to read my blog A Language of Abstraction.

This is step nine: LAYERING

As with all the steps in this series, layering has a practical side (putting paint on a surface) and a spiritual side (the language and purpose).

In short, layering is about creating depth in a painting, both visually and emotionally.


Visual Depth

Traditionally, visual depth in a painting is created by the use of color and tonal values. By gradually transitioning from dark to light shades, we can create a sense of receding space. Warm colours are placed in the foreground; cool colours in the background. This method was established by the Renaissance artists, the Great Masters, until photography burst onto the scene in the mid nineteenth century and artists from Manet, Cezanne, through to Matisse and Kandinsky challenged our perception.

Visual depth in abstract painting takes what the Great Masters taught us and plays with the idea, often bringing the background forwards and pushing the foreground backgrounds. You’ll often see the overlapping of shapes and forms and the use of variations in scale to give a sense of distance and perspective to the composition. This was an exciting development in painting, turning a still image into an ever-changing one.

In these stunning examples from some of my favourite artists, the layering of translucent colour, texture and the changing of scale and perspective is very inspiring to me.

Working in layers also adds history and story to the piece. As I’m painting on translucent screen printing mesh for my new work, it makes visual layering even more possible and exciting.

Using translucent glazes and washes to opaque heavy body paint and by using layers of medium between the application of paint or collage, I can play with the notion of foreground and background and the depth of space.

I can also leave the surface free of paint, or add a layer of transparent acrylic medium or ground, which gives a similar transparency to that of tracing paper.

Acrylic, oil pastel, neocolor and coloured pencil on screenprinting mesh.

I’m also experimenting with applying other drawing media to a surface after a clear ground has been applied on top of the acrylic paint layer. I’m particularly enjoying oil pastels, artist crayons (Caran D’ache neocolor) and coloured pencils.

Emotional Depth

When I was screenwriting, layering up the story with subtext and symbolism was my favourite part of the process. Storytelling is largely about metaphor and parables; it helps us to understand and relate to complex or unfamiliar issues we might otherwise never encounter and translates them into universal emotions.

As a screenwriter I found it relatively easy to assign symbolism to my character’s emotions and actions, but when it comes to my own, I have struggled.

I have looked back at my body of work so far and know the subject matter and shapes that attract and inspire me; I have taken time to study my personal writings and have a good grasp of my inner landscape. All of this has taken time and patience, reflection and objectivity (which is why there has been such a long gap between this blog and my previous one).

Common themes are fragility, disconnection, loneliness, self-consciousness, self-imposed prisons of anxiety and fear, the yearning for boldness, community and the courage to explore new things.

I’ve found a visual language that helps me express these emotions and desires. It is now my plan to create a kind of dictionary or thesaurus of motifs. However, I don’t want it to become prescriptive or “concrete”, but a foundational approach so the work carries the “spirit” of the concept.

To do that, I’ve learnt to ask a key question.

What’s going on inside?

Any artist in any medium will ask themselves the question: what is my art really about?

It’s not a question we can answer when we first begin; we can only answer it once we have created a body of work. It is the work that gives us the answer. For some, the impatient ones amongst us, will find this frustrating, but the truth of the matter is that the meaning of our art cannot be dictated to, cannot be forced; it is an expression of our deeper selves and we must not rush it. The key is to always pursue projects that speak to us, that stir something in us. As the old adage goes: where we spend our time, our heart is also.

Since 2014 when I returned to my art practice after being a screenwriter, I found joy in continuous-line doodles of architecture. Both the architecture and the continuous-line were equally important. As I struggled with depression, I felt an ever deepening disconnection with the world around me and the single-line was a kind of life line; a visual way to remind myself not to let go.

Since then, I have made a few notes concerning my personal and emotional connection to architecture, not only through people (as I have close family members who are architects), but also through my fascination with the history of a space; the idea that a building has stood still amidst the swirl of human activity; so many stories in the same small space separated by time.

It wasn’t until I started using words like: façade, boundaries, views, community [in relation to buildings] and asking “what’s going on inside?” that I saw a greater human link. I began to notice how certain buildings stirred different emotions in me. Cafés, hotels, theatres and railway stations, for example, held a surge of anxiety or flutter of excitement. I began to see buildings as portraits and as metaphors for relationships. How do I fit in? How do I relate to the community? Where do my anxieties surface? Where do I find joy? Am I being watched from those windows? Is that door or chair inviting me to enter or sit down? In relationships, we either talk or listen; pay attention or don't. Are we together or am I alone? Open or closed?

Cafés and pubs are central to relationships; hotels evoke vulnerability, theatres trigger my performance anxiety, churches challenge my faith question, train stations invite adventure, freedom and possibility. A monument, often the centre of attention, gives a sense of achievement and self—esteem.

All of these motifs can be used in an image to tell my inner story.

Inspiration: The symbolic work of Friedensreich Hundertwasser

I think one of my deepest influences in this area is Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928-2000). In fact, he’s had such an impact that I can’t believe he hasn’t come up in my blog before! It was Hundertwasser’s depiction of “energy flow” in the environment that initially influenced my single-line doodles.

Hunderwasser’s body of work (including his prints, paintings, installations and architecture), all illustrate and explore his world view: that we live within five skins: the epidermis, our clothes, our houses, our social (immediate) environment and the global environment. He strongly believed we were responsible for looking after all five.

Not only does he play with perspective and abstraction so beautifully, but he also expresses his ideas of personal connections to the environment and the dialogue flowing between ourselves and those five skins.

Notice how he uses composition and altered perspectives to create human figures and faces out of collections of buildings, giving personality to the community of shapes.

I’m currently exploring and developing this concept of “buildings as portraits” in my sketchbook. You can see some of them on my instagram page.

Which takes us to the final step in this series (yet the beginning of the next stage in my journey): PRACTICE