“Pawpaw and Sam” contemporary figurative painting. acrylic on canvas. 12 in x 12 in.

“Pawpaw and Sam” contemporary figurative painting

Pawpaw and Sam in the shed near the Buick, painted from an old photo. I’m trying to restrict myself to a more painterly style with thick opaque strokes that minimally blended on the canvas.  Previously, I have been trying to take advantage of dry-brush techniques and transparent layering, but working that way allowed me to develop bad habits, namely scrubbing paint into the canvas and over blending the brushstrokes so that everything looked flat.  There is an analogy with mosaics: Mosaics made from uniformly square pieces don’t look as good as mosaics made from pieces where the squares are less uniform and broken more randomly or naturally. Similarly, painting with original brushstrokes is more interesting than a painting where the brushstrokes have been blended into flat uniform regions of color. A little bit of visual “noise” allows the imagination to see an image that seems more real than a “perfect” painting.  I would like to paint a larger version of this painting so that I can concentrate on capturing likeness.