New Studio

First of all, apologies to those who have been religiously checking for my blog updates in the past several months (<wink>).  The primary reason for the absence of updates is simple: Laziness.  The secondary reason is that I have been busy setting up my new studio in a former button warehouse:

The studio is 1200 sq ft, or as Kate Stone put it (and I quote):

1200 square feet? All to yourself? ASSHOLE!!!

(Note to Kate, I have no air conditioning, and this is Hong Kong.)

I actually would have been OK with a smaller space.  However, I wanted to start painting subjects that were lit by--nay, bathed in--natural light, and for that I'd need very large windows.  And apparently (at least in Hong Kong) there is some kind of positive correlation between window size and floor space.  As a warmup--to get to know the studio, so to speak--I did the following small still life.  It is my first ever still life lit by natural light:

Due to the effect of sinking in, some areas are less than crisp.  But they should look fine after oiling in.  I might write a little more on this piece in a later post.  One thing I quickly learned doing this piece is that, since the studio windows faced southwest, the light was significantly warmer and changed really fast past 2 pm.  As a result, I could only work on this painting in a golden time period from about 9 am to 2 pm, when the light was somewhat cold and steady.  You might ask, why don't you get a studio with a north window.  Believe me, I tried.  Originally there was an available studio of the same size that faced north on the 17th floor of the same building, but: the entire 18th floor is a roast meat plant.  Mind you, I like (love, even) bacon, but it's quite another thing to try to channel the spirits of Rembrandt, Caravaggio and Chardin while immersed in the sweet aroma of burnt lard.

Another unexpected discovery of working for only a few hours on a painting is that sometimes it might be better not to labour on the same painting continuously for more than 5 hours.  I find that I get to better sustain a fresh perspective this way.  Though perhaps this is just the lazy little guy in me talking.

Here's a view from the studio's windows:

Yes, outside there is a double-decker bus (one of those things we inherited from the British colonial days) repairing yard, though that's not too bad, since the studio is on the 13th floor.

If you keep yours eyes above a certain level, you could almost forget about the bus depot and see a lot of green.  While that might seem scenic, I suspect the green might in fact be a problem painting-wise, since its high chroma probably compounds the problem of getting the warm southwestern light.  I actually painted the studio walls a cold white and the floor a cool, dark battleship gray to try to mitigate that problem.  I am going to leave it to the experts to tell me whether actually works.

And then there's this:

Sigh... this painting was begun in a much smaller studio.  Significant perspective problems, arm on the left is too long, face might be too small for the head, unconvincing fabric, I ain't no Caravaggio, yadayadayada... 6 months, SIX nauseating months on this, at the cost of making no other painting, no social life (fine, I have none anyway), and heaps of frustration.  Given that I now have a valuable source of unadulterated natural light (barring the occasional smog), and that I'd need to start pumping out more work.  The rickshaw puller is going to be mothballed in the foreseeable future.  Chalk it up as an edifying misadventure, I guess.