Magic Squares Painting

Acrylic On Canvas 10 x 10

Artists Studied:

Paul Klee

Reflection:

I was inspired by Paul Klee’s hardships and inspirations from those hardships such as the death of close friends in WWI. I feel as though he would listen to slower or more reflective music influence his works. I used the thought of these difficulties to decide on a genre of music. I picked sort of sad and more emotional music, I also was inspired by this music genre for the idea of my painting which was “light at the end of the tunnel.” I liked how this genre of music pushed me to create really deep and dark colors and strive to my best abilities try to reach similarities of Paul Klee.

In my original idea, I wanted to push chromatic color choices and have the dark edges recede into very light values of the same colors. As I was working, the colors were becoming very Easter-like and precisely what I didn’t want. As a way to combat this road block, I continued the darker values and pushed for smokey values towards the center instead of simply lighter values. The subtle differences of the darkest boxes are very soft and as the intensity increases somewhat with the grayer values, the loudness also increases with these. The density in my painting is mostly found in the smallest boxes because the shapes are naturally smaller. Also density can also be found in the darkest values in my painting because the values are so deep and close to each other. I think the spaciousness can be found in between the smallest and largest boxes. These boxes have medium values and the viewer can clearly see the difference in values between them.

If I were to do this again I’d like to create more depth with values much like in my painting. I would enjoy pushing past the easier one-point perspective composition and moving toward a more creative and abstract composition. I would love to explore more with the expression of sounds and the study of music in relation to a painting or drawing. I’d also like to explore more with the change in values and how I can work with the acrylic to capture a lighter value to my liking.