Tag: contemporary painting

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Music on the Move (carrera walkman/portable cassette player)

walkman portable cassette player painting

Summary

Original painting of a Walman / Carrera PX-12 Portable Cassette player by Contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Music on the Move’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

I have good memories of my walkman(s). The idea that you used to listen to the same tape for days or even weeks sounds crazy but aso makes it more special in a way. And the fact that you had to keep changing the batteries and often create the painting yourself…old skool indeed! I even remember us borrowing one from our uncle that looked like a giant car radio. You had to wear it on your back like a backpack. Cool but very unpractical.

Anyway, today I used paper instead of canvas to paint on. I had to get used to painting on paper. I’m not sure if I need to use a different kind, but the paper started to wrinkle a bit when I started painting on it. It did however straighten out when the paint dried up, but it got in the way of painting a bit.

For this artwork, I did not really use an underpainting or base layer as I was afraid that using to many painting layers would mess up the paper. So I chose yellow (mixed with a bit of magenta) as my background color. Then I just started painting by hand. I noticed my proportions were a bit off compared to the reference photo, but I kept it like this because I didn’t want to mess around to much as I was afraid to ruin the paper. It also seemed harder to cover up ‘mistakes’ by painting over it on paper compared to canvas, so I just left it alone. The rest of the process was fairly simple: block in the big shapes and start adding details, shadows and highlights later on.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24x30cm / 9×11 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black | White

Availability

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De Phenix Painting (rice warehouse/peeling company)

de phenix rice warehouse peeling company

Summary

Original painting of a rice peeling company in Zaandam, The Netherlands by artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘De Phenix’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

Today was my brother’s birthday.  He loves architecture, especially older architecture and the history that comes with it. We grew up in the Zaandam, The Netherlands, so I painted this old rice warehouse and peeling company dating from 1913. It faces our main city river called ‘de Zaan’.

I started with drawing the outlines of the buildings with pencil. Then I filled the sky, the buildings and the river and basically repeated this process, adding the smaller details of these parts.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24x30cm / 9×11 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White
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Misting Fan (water spray fan) Painting

misting water spray fan original painting

Summary

Original small still life painting of a hand held misting fan by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Console Gamer’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

My mom got me this water spraying misting fan last year. It has a battery and when you press the button on top, the fan starts to rotate. Then when you pull the lever in front it blows a nice, refreshing cloud of mist in your face.

I was recording the painting progress, but half way through, the software crashed and it didn’t save the video. I did not make pictures either, so no progress video/images this time, sorry!

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Console Gamer (video game) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

video game painting

Summary

Original painting progress of a painting showing a first person view of a gamer, a ps4 gaming headset and a PlayStation Dualshock 4 controller by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Console Gamer’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

This painting shows a first view of a gamer sitting on a couch (although not visible in the artwork), a gaming headset and a Playstation controller. Another relatively quick speed painting. No serious preparations, I just created a Vermillion background, outlined my composition with some Primary Cyan. Then I started filling the piece with color, working my way down to the smaller details, although I purposely gave it a somewhat unfinished and loose look.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Key Essentials (sunglasses and keys) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

sunglasses key chain car key still life painting

Summary

Original painting progress video of some sunglasses, a car key and a key chain by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Key Essentials’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

I did not have a lot of time to create a painting this day, but I had some leftover paint on my palette from a couple of days ago and decided to use it to make a small speed painting.

It was a sunny day and I this made me want to create a small still life of some personal belongings you often take with you on days like these.

As I mentioned I used the paint that was still on my palette. It was already starting to dry up which complicated things. I had to work quick and dirty :). I quickly covered my background with some Vermillion, painted the outlines and shadows of the objects with some primary Cyan and started filling everything with color. The small still life is very simple with lots of the background color coming through the top layer, which in my opinion creates a cool effect. However, I looked at the piece the next day and thought it was missing some color. So I changed the background color as you can see in the image on top of this page.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Snoop Dogg Painting -Time-Lapse Video

snoop doggy dogg painting

Summary

Original painting of rapper Snoop Dogg by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Snoop D.O. Double G’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

I don’t do portraits enough, when in fact they can be fun to do. For me they are also one of the hardest topics to do well. It’s very challenging to capture someone’s features well. Snoop Dogg is an interesting character to say the least, and I’ve listened to his music a lot back in the day (still do every now and then). I particularly liked this close-up of him with the sunglasses, braids and yellow beads and decided to make it my painting subject.

Now for the progress. I started with adding a blue background simply because the reference background was a blue sky and I thought this was fine to use. I made the color a bit more saturated though so it would look good together with the beads in Snoop’s braids. Because I think it can be quite hard to capture a person with paint in general, for me it’s even harder to do it in 60 to 90 minutes. This is why I created a line drawing first to make sure every feature was in the right place. I used what I think is called a fineliner (ink pen). This part is not part of the video as it can take quite some time, depending on the detail you put in.

Anyway, once the base drawing was in place, I continued with coloring in the face, hair and just a indication of the t-shirt, using the ink line drawing as my guide. Then I added the lighter parts of the face. I think I used only three or four tones for the face as it’s a speed painting and this is enough to capture the main values. The glasses are not detailed at all, I only put in some very rough strokes and added a couple of highlights.

Now that te main stuff was in place, I added the smaller details like some subtle shadows in the face and highlights of the hair, beads and necklace. Very high level though. I think it worked out well, especially when looking at it from a distance. Hope you enjoyed this one!

Original Painting

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Mixed Media (Ink & Acrylic on canvas)
  • Dimensions: 24×30 cm / 9×11 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Funky Cucumber (glass of cucumber water) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

glass of cucumber water painting - vegetable still life

Summary

Original painting progress video of a piece of cucumber and a glass of cucumber water by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Funky Cucumber’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

Tried something new this time. In some of my previous paintings I started with Vermillion as my base layer. To see what surprises may happen, I tried Magenta this time. next I created outlines and used green which I already mixed to paint my cucumber with. Then I started coloring in the main colors of the cucumber and used a blueish / purple tone for my background. Because I wanted parts of the Magenta background to come through, I did not totally cover it.

hen I did the same for the surface; in my reference, the glass and cucumber were laying on a cutting board made of wood. I replaced this by using an almost white color, because I thought it would work well together with the magenta and background and it would create a nice contrast at the same time. Definitely out of my comfort zone, but this was an interesting little piece to work on.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Tabasco Gone Sideways (Tabasco Sauce Bottle) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

tabasco bottle still life painting

Summary

Original painting progress video of a bottle of Tabasco sauce by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Tabasco Gone Sideways’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

A different day, a different painting subject. Tabasco bottles have been painted countless times, so it’s not the most original subject. To give it a twist I put the bottle on its side. This actually made it a lot harder to paint for me. I struggled with the proportions and symmetry. All in all, good practice!

The approach is similar to the previous painting(s). I painted the outlines of my subject with a color already close to the colour of the sauce (mixed some magenta with yellow and a tiny bit of cyan). Then I painted in the dark/shadow parts using that same color. after this it was basically a matter of adding the green label, the background, some darker and lighter values for the sauce and adding some smaller text and highlights to the bottle. I used the main features of the bottle and left out all the small details because I painted quite fast and all the smaller bits don’t fit in with the overall level of detail of this piece.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Yesterday’s Dessert (Two McDonald’s Milkshakes) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

Summary

Original painting progress video of two McDonald’s Milkshakes by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Yesterday’s Dessert’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

So, somewhere this week we came back from an afternoon drive and had not prepared dinner and decided to go through the McDrive. This was an interesting experience in itself with Covid-19 going on. Payment devices and meals were being handed out to customers with trays on sticks.

Anyway,  after finishing my ‘Double Tasty’ (never having that one again, should have sticked with my quarter pounder menu) I looked at the carton holding our medium and large-sized strawberry milkshakes and thought it would make a nice painting to remember that evening by.

So far for the little background story, now for the approach. I really didn’t think about an approach for this art piece and did not even prepare the canvas this time. I started painting with the paint left on my canvas from the day before. So I used vermillion (the red-orange paint) to create my line work/composition.

Then I thought, together with The yellow M’s and the vermillion of the outlines coming through here and there, teal could work well as a background. So I painted teal around the cups to see how that looked. Next I put in the shadows of the paper cups, using a mixture of white, magenta, cyan and primary yellow and did the same for the cartboard carrier tray that holds the cups by adding some more magenta and blue to create darker shadows.

From that point onward it was just a matter of putting in details, highlights and filling the background. The piece remained quite loose and rough looking.

 

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability

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Sambal Oelek (Hot pepper paste) Painting -Time-Lapse Video

sambal oelek hot peper paste still life painting

Summary

Original painting of some hot pepper paste in a jar by contemporary artist Bart Carels.

Title: ‘Sambal Oelek’
Artist: Bart Carels
Year: 2020

Description

Probably one of the most well known sambals (at least in The Netherlands). For this one-day speed painting, I prepared the canvas by covering it with a mixture of white gesso and vermillion (red-0range). Next I created my under drawing (just the linework, no values) to make sure my composition and proportions were acceptable. After this I started filling the jar with dark tones. This gave me a better idea of what color I could use for the background (I did not use the actual color from the reference I used). When I do use the color from reference, I often start with the background before working on the subject. But to me, there really is no correct approach.

Anyway, with the background colors visible, I started working on the details like highlights and shadows. Because for these speed paintings, my time is limited, I try to make sure the painting progresses nicely and in each stage, all parts have the same level of detail. Of course when you want to focus on a specific part of your artwork (like the jar in my case) you can choose to add some more details to it.

Painting Specifications:

  • Just one in the world
  • Medium: Acrylic on canvas
  • Dimensions: 24×18 cm / 9×7 inches
  • Color Palette: Cyan | Magenta | Yellow | Black |White

Availability