Wednesday, January 26, 2011

MOBY-DICK, Page 546

Title: ...Moby Dick was now again steadily swimming forward...

12 inches by 8.25 inches
acrylic paint on watercolor paper
January 20, 2011

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8 comments:

  1. BuckJanuary 26, 2011 at 12:06 PM

    I'm reminded of another maritime classic, Homer's Odyssey. I always thought of his 'wine dark sea' as ominous; concealing the dangers below.

    All alone on the wine dark sea.

    Shivers.

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  2. WOPettitJanuary 26, 2011 at 2:56 PM

    powerfull....

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  3. TitusJanuary 26, 2011 at 4:23 PM

    Lovely graphic; proportions, colours all just so, and then those splashy bits.

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  4. voicenovoice/élisabeth guinsbourgJanuary 26, 2011 at 4:53 PM

    wow! that eye (i followed previous suggestion and double clicked... duh)
    à demain! (till tomorrow)

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  5. Matt KishJanuary 27, 2011 at 10:08 AM

    Buck, an interesting connection. I had briefly - and I mean very briefly - considered attempting this illustration project with "The Odyssey" but I didn't feel familiar enough with the text to attempt it. Still, one of my favorite stories ever. I think that even if I live to be 125 years old, I will never tire of reading seagoing quest narratives.

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  6. Matt KishJanuary 27, 2011 at 10:08 AM

    Bill, thank you, EXACTLY what I wanted to show here. Power. Steadily moving forward.

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  7. Matt KishJanuary 27, 2011 at 10:10 AM

    Titus, oddly enough, the splashy bits were an afterthought and an accident. I had painted the white first, and then I had gone over it with a lot of black. I was holding the brush, loaded with white again, staring at the piece and trying to decide how to add some kind of lines to show that powerful steady forward motion. At that moment, a fat drop of watered down white paint fell from the brush on to the black sea, near the front of the whale. I wasn't worried since I knew I could easily paint over it with black so I watched it a bit. I added more and more and more and it seemed to be just what the image needed. In a way, this picture painted itself.

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  8. Matt KishJanuary 27, 2011 at 10:11 AM

    Lizzy, I seem to be fascinated by eyes. Whenever I crop these images to make the little thumbnails that I post on my spudd64.com site, I find myself homing in on the eyes every single time. It's a strange obsession.

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