CAVERNS

CAVERNS

What exactly “is” a Finger Painting?

Over the winter, I began a series of acrylic paintings, trying out various techniques. But once I started oil painting, I set the acrylic series to the side. A recent e-workshop I took with Flora Bowley got me rethinking about them and I was quite excited to adapt some of her ideas with what I had already been doing to complete them. I pulled the series out and began finger painting on them, along with using a foam brush, and a small half-inch flat brush. I added 4-5 new layers on top of what the paintings already had, and they look amazing! The depth of layers and colors is just striking.

But now my conscious is getting in my way. I am actually hesitant to show these to you.  Why you ask? Because they aren’t 100% finger paintings. I used a foam brush and a small flat brush about 20% of the time, and finger painted about 80% of the time, so are these still finger paintings? Or do they even need to be pure finger paintings to legitimately be called that?

My motivation behind these is the same it has always been. I love experimenting with different styles of painting, and believe that is what art is all about…the process. With this series that included combining finger painting with tools, so what category do they fall in?

DWELLING 12" X 12" X 1.5" Acrylic on Gallery Wrapped Canvas

DWELLING

I can not even begin to tell you how stressed I am over this. With the redesign of the website coming, and going almost strictly to finger painting…where is the line to what I show you?

My dilemma:

  • Do I only tell you about oil paintings I am working on, or do I also include my experiments in acrylic too?
  • And if  80% of the painting is done by finger painting, but 20% is done with a brush. Is it still a finger painting? Or does my occasional use of a brush, or a palette knife  prohibit them from being called a finger painting?
  • If these are not considered finger paintings, then do I just put them on a different site?

I am really conflicted about this, and would love to hear what you think.

 Please comment below and let me know your thoughts on this. ~ Cyd

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“Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns

in order to look at things in a different way.” ~ Edward de Bono

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