Painting in Abstract

£14.99

Mixed media artwork inspired by the natural world by Carole Robson

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Book Description

Learn to capture the abstract beauty of the natural world in paint and mixed media with this inspiring book.

A practical, mixed media art book, illustrated with finished paintings and short exercises that encourage an experimental approach to painting the natural landscape.

Carole Robson's aim is to inspire readers with her own enthusiasm for art and, as a teacher, to help them to achieve their own artistic goals. Her work is a celebration of the natural landscape, and her intention is always to shine a light on nature in order to elevate its case, especially poignant now that nature is in such jeopardy.

This book guides the reader through simple combinations of wet media such as watercolour, gouache, acrylic and Indian inks. It goes on to examine and include other media and techniques; exploring media that combine happily, and those that resist each other to create interesting and unexpected effects.

It offers strategies for developing concepts and improving design, with a chapter devoted to the formal elements line, shape, colour, tone, texture and surface pattern that can be harnessed to produce impactful work. Readers will be provided the tools and inspiration to find their own interpretations.

Carole covers various aspects of the natural landscape, from close-up details to more distant views, celebrating wild flowers, seed heads, berries and leaves. It peers inquisitively into ditches, hedgerows and verges, and soaks up the idyll of flower-rich meadows. It will visit the tranquility of woodland scenes as well as the atmospheric, wild elements of stormy skies and high seas.

Exciting techniques such as washing or spraying off an image, using improvised mark-making tools, preparing a variety of collage papers such as painting through tissue paper are included; alongside printing or stencilling acrylic gel or texture paste to enliven a surface.

This book offers a unique route into creativity and innovation for the reader, whether beginner or expert artist.

Introduction 6

Framing the mind 8

The formal elements 14

Exploring your Materials 52

Towards the abstract 62

Irresistible Resists 70
River Birds step-by-step project 80

Layers 88
Nocturne step-by-step project 94

Collage and Print 102
Autumn Seed Heads step-by-step project 116

Afterword 124

Index 128

About the Author

About Carole Robson

Carole was brought up in a rural area of North Staffordshire. She moved South to study for her degree and post graduate qualifications at Central St. Martin's School of Art and subsequently freelanced as a book illustrator for major London Publishers. She worked on a wide variety of commissions and her illustrations are published worldwide.

Carole is a mixed media painter and art tutor, working from her studio in Laddingford, Kent, she exhibits in London and the South East of England. Her paintings are driven by strong feelings about ecology and man's impact on the environment; her desire is to elevate nature's case and celebrate meadows and wild places. She has visited the Kent Wildlife reserve, Marden Meadow regularly for over thirty years, which is a rare, unimproved hay meadow connecting us back to a pre-industrial past. Distillation of these observations, memory and imagination form the basis of many of her landscapes. While inspired by all nature she particularly enjoys weedy patches and the fragility of weathered plants, which retain a kind of nobility in their structure even in their dry, decaying state.

Carole is a mixed media painter with a first love of watercolour. She is experimental, combining media, resist techniques and a variety of mark making. In the last few years Carole has brought digital art into her practice and is frequently re-inspired by the new colour combinations or abstractions achieved.

Press

artbookreview.wordpress.com

Books on abstraction appear now with some regularity and that means publishers are getting beyond the basics. This one is particularly useful as it comes from an experienced practitioner and covers both creative and practical aspects of the genre.

Carole works in a good variety of media that include watercolour, gouache, acrylic and ink as well as pencils and pastels. You wont, therefore, feel constrained by a single one that isnt perhaps your first choice. Its also worth reporting that you wont get to the materials section for 52 pages youve been through all the looking, seeing and thinking before you start to get the brushes out.

Carole works with natural subjects flowers, landscapes and water and her style is well beyond representation, while always retaining the essential essence of what is depicted. The abstraction comes from simplified forms, use of colour and technical manipulation. She includes plenty of basic instruction, exercises and demonstrations that explain her approach as well as developing your skills.

Overall, this is one of the most thorough and complete guides to abstraction Ive seen.

Artists Magazine September/October 2024

What happens when you combine the properties of mixed media with a focus on the beauty of the natural world? You get the new book, Painting in Abstract, by English mixed-media artist Carole Robson. Through finished paintings and short exercises, she delves into watercolor, gouache, acrylic and inks and their impactful effects on one another through various techniques. She also offers strategies for developing concepts and improving design, with a focus on line, shape, color, tone, texture and surface pattern. If you want to take a more experimental approach to your work, Robson offers a strong foundation.

Leisure Painter

This is practical, mixed-media art book, illustrated with finished paintings and short exercises that encourage an experimental approach to painting the natural landscape. Carole Robson's aim is to inspire readers with her own enthusiasm for art and, as a teacher to help you achieve your own artistic goals. The book guides you through simple combinations of wet media such as watercolour, gouache, acrylic and Indian inks. It goes on to examine and include other media and techniques; exploring media that combine happily, and those that resist each other to create interesting and unexpected effects. It also offers strategies for developing concepts and improving design, with a chapter devoted to the formal elements line, shape, colour, tone, texture and surface pattern that can be harnessed to produce impactful work.

The Artist

Art, Edgar Degas reminded us, is what you make others see. Abstraction, therefore, is a made-up language in which the artist communicates in terms we're invited to understand. To put it more simply, it is your opportunity to invite the viewer to share your emotional reaction to the subject in front of you. If that sounds like nonsense, this probably isn't a book for you, which is fair enough and I won't waste any more of your time. Still with me? Be glad, for this is a book which takes its subject and its readers seriously. Where a lot of books on abstraction are project-based, Carole gets under the skin of not just the how, but the why. Her paintings are firmly planted in natural forms but use all the technical possibilities of mixed-media work to wring meaning out of what are always more than just splashes and runs.

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