From Sketch to Painting: The Studio Process
My work rarely begins on the canvas itself. It starts in what unfolds around me and first takes shape in sketches. From sketch to painting, the process develops through layers, material and time.
sketches and charcoal studies
The sketches emerge intuitively. Not as preparation for a final image, but as a first response. A way of holding on to something that is not yet clear. In charcoal or quick lines, I search for form, for gesture, for presence.
What I draw there is not always immediately recognizable as an “image.” It is more a process of searching. A sensing of what is beginning to appear.
From Sketch to Painting process
From these sketches, studies begin to take shape. I explore color, material, surface. What happens when a line becomes a layer, when a form translates into paint? What remains, what disappears, what changes in character? From sketch to painting, the process develops through layers and material.
This phase remains open. Not everything needs to lead somewhere immediately. Work can rest, return, be picked up again. I let it simmer. Sometimes in my studio, sometimes in our outdoor workspace on “the land.” There, I return to it while working outside, looking at it again with fresh eyes.
layering and texture
In painting, I always work in layers. Technical layers, but also layers of meaning. An image does not appear in a single movement, but grows. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly.
At times, a work unfolds almost immediately, as if everything falls into place at once. At other times, the process needs more time. The image keeps shifting, searching, forming itself again.
This layering exists not only in the material, but also in meaning.
Color and Composition
Feeling is leading, but not the only guide. At the same time, I look at composition. How do forms relate to each other? What role does a discovered symbol take within the surface?
An image needs to resonate not only in energy, but also in balance. In rhythm, in tension.
Symbols in Development
The symbolism in my work does not arise beforehand. Often I cannot immediately define what a form means. Only over time do I come into contact with it.
As described on the Symbols & Narrative page, symbols return across different works and series. They grow, transform, and reappear in different gradations and forms.
A hare becomes a figure, a figure becomes a carrier of something else. A house remains a house, but shifts in position, in meaning, in strength.
when a painting is finished
When a work is “finished” cannot be precisely defined. It is a moment in which the image no longer asks, but is simply present. A moment where the layers come together and the work gains its own autonomy.
And even then, it remains open. For me, and for the viewer.
Stories begin to emerge.