Bestine Bazaar

 This painting came out of some photos some friends had taken in the new Star Wars area of Walt Disney World which showed the architecture of the planet Tatooine with Islamic lanterns adorning them which reminded me of my own Orientalist-inspired paintings. This made sense as the original Star Wars buildings are based on North Africa an area where I have already painted quite a few admittedly fictional locations. The obvious next step was to combine  these two elements in a painting as well as providing variety of subject matter for the paintings going to IX this year, although of course I was in the end unable to attend for medical reasons. The organisers of the show have offered me a solo online show for all this work on their online gallery "IX Gallery" next month.

I decided to use the lighting and softness of an earlier painting "Souk Al Medina" and then transpose these onto a setting on the planet Tatooine of the capital city which I believe is not shown in the movies called Bestine. I decided to have quite a disparity in height in the figures to emphasise the fact that not all the figures are human, after all Star Wars has many types of beings and non-beings in it's concept.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

Souk Al Medina

 

Refuge and The Night Owl sold

Refuge

 Very pleased to see that Abend Gallery in Denver CO have sold two paintings from my online exhibition "The Sleeping City", "Refuge" and "The Night Owl". 

"Refuge" is oil on fine cotton 16" x 12"

"The Night Owl" is oil on fine cotton 16" x 12".

The Night Owl

 

Chisen Ame sold

 "Chisen Ame" sold very quickly yesterday on Every Day Original. I think every one I have posted bar one has sold immediately on going live. 

Oil on fine cotton 16" x 12".

Dori Hinoiri sold

 This painting has just sold at The Haven Gallery, Northport, Long Island USA as part of a mixed show called "The Art Of Antiquity". The contact was made when the gallery saw my work on Instagram which goes to show that it's worth putting some effort into social media promotion! The curator/owner Erica Berkovitz looked at a number of paintings and chose this one for the show. I just had enough time to frame and then ship it to the USA before the show opened.

The painting is actually one from a projected series called "Into The Sun" which I didn't have  enough time to do many as I needed to get on with work for the upcoming IX in Reading PA which actually ends today - as you know in the end I was unable to get over to it due to medical problems - all those paintings will be in an online show on the IX Gallery website next month.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

Refuge Sold

 "Refuge" which is part of my online show at the Abend Gallery, Denver CO has sold. In a way this was the odd man out in the show as they are all American urban landscapes whereas this one is near Pulborough in the UK and is not really urban either... I wanted the freezing cold atmosphere of walking home on a Winter evening with the sound of the footsteps muffled by the snow and the prospect of warming up by the fire as symbolised by the warm light in the window.

Oil on fine cotton 16" x 12".

Bestine Bazaar - stage 5

 I worked on the nearest market stall at left today as it was important to set the style of how I am going to paint them which I will now apply to the others. I'm not hurrying this one as it might be the last painting for my IX online show next month. I then might well get on with paintings for a gallery in Denver CO which looks like it is going to represent me.

Bestine Bazaar - stage 4

 Painted in some buildings on the right, knocked back the background building again and started on the nearest market stall at left. Taking it slowly, a bit of a pot boiler this one... probably the last one I will paint for my IX online show next month.

Bestine Bazaar - stage 3

 Didn't get anything done yesterday due to other things going on. Today I started to knock back the main building more into the distance and fiddled around with the back end of the street trying to give it a sense of real space. Hoping to get everything ready tomorrow for all the market stalls to start going in.

Bestine Bazaar - stage 2

 Actually stage 5 by now but I've not been able to post all the stages for various reasons.... Still haven't painted in the spaceship and engine trail yet, I've been trying to knock it into shape as I go along, deciding to work on the nearest buildings first along with the large one in the distance. Looking a bit simple at the moment I will start on the incidental detail when it comes to painting in the shops lining the road.

New colours used: Yellow Lake Deep and Ultramarine Violet.

Abend Gallery

 I have an online show at the Abend Gallery in Denver CO which started on Saturday 14 October. The show is called "The Sleeping City" and has seven of my paintings from The Sleeping City series plus two nocturne paintings that were sent to the gallery for an earlier landscape exhibition. "Refuge" has sold (not in The Sleeping City" series) and I thought two others were but seemingly not now...

Here is the link to the show:

https://abendgallery.com/the-sleeping-city-by-mark-harrison

Here are the nine paintings in the show:

All Nite

Lonely Street

Shortcut

Station Blue

Steeltown

The Night Owl

The Somnambulist

Wrong Side Of The Tracks

Refuge

 

Bestine Bazaar - stage 1

 This is actually at a stage after the initial tonal underpainting and is actually the first pass of colour on the sky and some preliminary tone on the buildings etc.... forgot to post the earlier ones....

This painting came out of some photographs some friends had taken in the new Star Wars area of Walt Disney World which showed the architecture and buildings of the planet Tatooine with Islamic lanterns adorning them which reminded me of my own Orientalist paintings. This made sense as the original Star Wars buildings are based on North Africa an area where I have already painted quite a few in these locations. It seemed the obvious next step to combine these two elements together as I wanted some variety in the subject matter for my paintings going to IX this year - as it turns out of course I am unable to attend so this will join the rest of them in a solo show on the IX Gallery in November.

Colours used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Phtalocyanine Green, Permanent Orange,  Dioxazine Purple, Burnt Sienna, Zinc White and Warm White.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

Chisen Ame

 This one is intended for my upcoming slot this month (23 October) on Every Day Original, after this I will get back to work on paintings for my online show in November on IX Gallery. I wanted a rainy/misty atmosphere for this one with a sense of mystery with the lights near the shrine, are they from lamp posts or are they something else?....

I kept it pretty desaturated using mixes of colours as opposed to using neutral greys with the title approximating the Japanese for Rain Garden.

Oil on fine cotton 16" x 12"

There is a short step-by-step progress through this painting in earlier posts on this blog.

Chisen Shoyu - stage 2

 Despite an unexpected medical problem last night I am back from hospital and back to painting as it keeps me distracted/productive... Hopefully finishing tomorrow (?).

Chisen Shoyu - stage 1

 I forgot to photograph the earlier stages so what you see here is after the first colour pass after the initial tonal underpainting. This one is intended for my slot this month (23 October) on Every Day Original so I have gone back to the smaller size for this one. I'm hoping to keep it soft and desaturated to suit the misty rainy setting.

Colours used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Phthalocyanine Green, Dioxazine Purple, Indanthrene Blue, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Zinc White and Warm White.

Oil on linen 16" x 12"

The Vampire of San Polo

 I thought I needed a bit of variety for the work going to IX this month (of course I am not attending now so all this work is already for sale) so I thought it would be nice to return to my occasional series "Vampires of Venice". The early ones in this series were basically monochromes  but I am now painting them in colour albeit desaturated - this is to make them more realistic although I might return to the sepia photograph look in the future. San Polo is one of the districts (Sestiere) of Venice and have stayed in that area a couple of times over the years although never seen a vampire yet. I have always found Venice a mysterious city and love wandering around it at night and lends itself to the notion of lurking vampires, indeed there was a Klaus Kinski film of Vampires in Venice so it's not just me that has this notion. I like to have my vampires as Nosferatu as I think they are more creepy than the Hammer Horror ones.

I quite like the contrast between the soft background and the harder edge foreground so the next painting might well go in this direction....

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

The Vampire of San Polo - stage 4

 I'm going quite slowly with this as I haven't worked out how I am going to paint certain areas so I stopped here for today after finishing most of the foreground building barring some tweaks tomorrow and finishing the vampire. Tomorrow I have to work out how I transition from the foreground to the background probably by the use of foggy areas... decisions will be made over the breakfast coffee....

Haven Gallery

 My painting "Dori Hinoiri" is being exhibited in the Haven Gallery, Long Island NY in a group show called "The Art of Antiquity" which opened last night with the Private View. Hopefully it sells and maybe more importantly it takes me nearer to getting gallery representation in different parts of the USA (I already have work with the Abend gallery in Denver CO) as I don't want to be just known as a Fantasy artist (even though they are my own self generated ideas and haven't been commissioned for print in some way).... indeed I was working solely in the UK fine art market from 2000 to 2015 and only started painting "fantasy" pictures after contact was made with Illuxcon as it was then called in 2014.

The show runs to 29 October. Oil on linen 22" x 16".

Artists & Illustrators magazine

 I have a six page feature in the new (November) issue of Artists & Illustrators magazine in their "How I work in the studio" section. The Assistant Editor contacted me about six weeks ago with a view to doing a three page feature but it then changed to a six page one with me suggesting that it focused on my nocturne paintings. She gave me twenty questions to answer generally about my studio practice and background and then she edited them together. She asked me for a dozen or so paintings to choose from for which I supplied the hi res files and I'm pleased to see that the colours and contrast etc are well reproduced in the final printing. 

I have written about ten or so articles for the magazine over the years but have not heard from them in recent years and assumed the contact was dead as a new editor had taken over so it was a nice surprise when they contacted me particularly as I was having a difficult time with a medical problem.