GALLERY NEWS

What is a Painting?

A painting is its own thing. It exists by itself. It’s its own object. Its origins may come from something that’s outside, but it has to have its own life. So, it has to have its own depth and nuances because you aren’t just looking at a willow bush, well, you’re looking at a willow bush that’s about six steps from a willow bush.

How Does a Painting Take Form?

I see it, I draw it, maybe photograph it, too. I bring it back, maybe color the drawing, then I put in on the canvas. I don’t want to go out there and try and paint that willow bush sitting down. I want to bring it back and put on the canvas what I remember it as, what I felt like it was. Not try and get the little bits and pieces right.

Oil Pastels As a Way to Move Forward

Whenever I’ve felt that I’ve been stuck with my oil painting or felt like I wanted to change it or explore something new, I’ve always gone to oil pastels. It’s just I’ve hit them a little bit harder these days. The process – the way I work in oils and the way I work in oil pastels – is pretty similar.

Deciding What to Paint

You have to decide why it interests you. What’s important about this? Now, it can jump right out at you, why it’s important. It might take some thought. I don’t know. I’m not always into it, but it can be a little bit of a curse to walk down the street and see paintings all the time. Or to say, maybe that, maybe that. I just enjoy it.

If You See the Color, Paint the Color

There are a lot of painterly techniques that one could use to make things further away, closer, fade them away, put them in atmosphere. That’s never been my strong suit. When I see a color, say of mountains, it could be way back there, but I see it as bright blue or purple. If you see it in relation to what’s in front, it’s a little bit less, maybe, but I feel like if you see the color, paint the color. At least try it. I’m not trying to fool anybody, I’m just trying to paint what I see and what I feel. 

Andy Taylor is an oil painter living and working out of his studio in Carbondale, Colorado. Taylor has been studying, drawing, painting, and remembering “insignificant” scenes – moments in a landscape that cause the artist to pause, study and draw what’s important about the scene, and translate that memory to canvas.