I takes me a great deal of time to create these. They are never what I set out to create. They happen on the paper. I am still in the process of learning about the different rice papers and what the pigment does on them. I like going along the edges with my brush and a dark color, most evident in the top painting. I also like washing a transparent color over what I have created to accentuate a mood, most evident in the second painting. As I worked on this I tried to finish them toward the vision I saw coming from the design on the paper. The first one I titled Glacial Remnants and the second one, Canopy. I love this way of working. It is as though I am immersing myself in the art and the materials and allowing them to help me work a vision forward.
Leslie White 
43 Comments
These are truly lovely.
Thank you, Lisa! I am still enjoying what I read in this post today: http://lisawieldswords.wordpress.com/2012/04/08/the-question-of-art/
Thanks so much for including the link to my post.
That is a great post… 🙂 Thank you!
I love these! The top abstract would coincide nicely with the guided imagery I just posted on Facebook, Mission Peace! You are so talented in your use of texture, color and allowing the work to develop. Can’t wait to see your next piece.
Wow! Thank you for saying this about liking it well enough to pair with one of your guided imagery pieces. 🙂
PS The second painting captures the mode of walking deep into the forest, I love it!
That is the way I felt about this one. I stared at it for the longest time before I saw the hint of a possible moon I could bring forward with some white goauche. Thank you!
These are both beautiful, Leslie. I really love the bottom one. I like the warm colors and the feeling of being deep in the woods. Canopy is a perfect name.
Thank you, Beth. That second one is actually my favorite of the two right now. Sometimes I think these dark, warm ones look more hand rendered when they are finished. There is a definite mood to the second one, also. I know you will give this a try at some point…. have fun when you do. 🙂 I think acrylic artist use textured rice papers from time totime, also.
Beautiful! The top painting reminds me of an asian style landscape, and the bottom a woods but in a completely different look. Very nice!
Different in almost a homemade primal sort of way, don’t you think, Ryan. I want to touch these moreso than I do my other paintings and I think it has to do with the built up textures. Thank you!
I love this approach. When I first looked at the second image, before I read the name, it felt like a reflection in water with the moon showing through. This is beautiful work Leslie.
Do you have another blog started, Kirsty? I lost track of the project one and the only one I can find is the photo one you did several years back.
I am so thankful you pointed out the appearance of a reflection on water because I can “see” itnow that you mention it. The oblong fibersserve as a disturbance on the surfaceof the water and the moon himmers in and through. Very cool! Thank you!
Leslie, I love them both. While looking at them and dreaming a bit, I think I see two spheres. Like the sun and the moon.
Oh yes. 🙂 The spheres are there. The one is the sun and the other the moon. I brought them out as I created. Somehow, circle formations form a lot in these works of mine. Thank you, Hannekekoop!
The thrill of being shown is like discovering the world all over again. Is it awe and joy in one big bundle. It’s great to watch you give yourself this gift, Leslie.
It is awe and joy in one big bundle, Amy. I have always admired the art that has a little lean toward the abstract but never really knew how to express myself in that direction. …but I have to admit I needed to trust “letting go” a bit. Thank you, Amy.
In the bottom one, I’m thinking I see a thick forest with a peep of light of open land just through the thickekts.
🙂 I think you have got it, Deb. We had a discussion last week about who saw things in abstracts and who did not. I, personally, like to search for something recognizable. The hunt is ever so much fun. Sometimes I have to get way back and off the abstracts at a show. This is a funny story. We have an artist in town who teaches at the University. He is known for his abstract oil paintings and the texture he builds up. Anywho, over time, I began to step back to look at his and could always see something in them. There was one painting, however, that I could find nothing in. It hung at two shows. The third show it hung in had brighter light in the gallery and as I walked in I saw it from across the room, a couple dancing. I saw the couple dancing in his painting. I’ll never forget that. If I could have afforded the price of that painting, I would have brought it home. It was the journey and the long awaited award.
That is a funny story. 🙂 Sometimes we have to see in a few times on different days before we see something. Like your first one. Now that I have returned I see I sun, with a large tree in front of landscape. Stange I didn’t see it before….it’s so clear to me now. 🙂
Have great day, Leslie.
Leslie, you are getting stunning colors and textures with your work of late. In fact, I almost grabbed some rice paper at my last trip to Dick Blick, but decided to wait a bit and watch some more. I’m loving your effects! Thank you too for the link on Amelia Earhart. I wonder if they will find anything???
Thank you for your comment to my textures and colors, Sherry. I am having fun with this. I really like to collage, also: https://lesliepaints.wordpress.com/2010/09/21/self-portrait-challenge/
Wouldn’t it be fascinating if they could find something that suggests what may have happened? I had to go looking for that article due to hearing something on the news about her a few weeks back.
Brilliant pictures! The first one seems to bring me to a warm summers evening.
Love the colours and textures you use
Thank you, Littleskew! 🙂
Lovely work Leslie. I see you have an eye for this sort of approach too. Your powerful use of colour always makes a statement, whatever you turn your hand to. I would love to see a demo of your work.
Thank you for that comment, Keith. These take me a few days to make…I put them up in between layers and look at them while stages dry. I never really know what I am going to get. 🙂
Love the textures. Really beautiful!
Thank you, Nuno!
Your artwork is very awesome and imaginative. Your imagery is very rich and fascinating. I love the layers of marks and the free and expressive way you paint. Your work is also reflective and spiritual. Wonderful intriguing work.
Thank you for leaving a comment, Shelley. “reflective and spiritual” is about the nicest thing you could say and today is a GOOD day, Thank you!
Hi Leslie…I appreciate how the art that you are making here is negotiated between you, your materials, and the processes you use!
It is nowhere near the raw elements of media that you work with, Al, but I do like creating this way. Thank you for this comment.
Leslie, I’m always interested in how your work emerges from your beginning marks. You have a wonderful sense of composition and color.
Thank you, Carol. I am enjoying my lack of knowing what to do with these. Each and every one of them carries me through a series of yays and nays before I settle on calling it done. Some of them look pretty awful. The great part is that I think the papers, pigment and water are actually doing some educating, here. I love it when I get lost in a painting.
I particularly like the one at the bottom. The transparancy does conjour up the image of leaves & the colours contrast well. You’ve reminded me that next week I’m going to use a similar technique with kids at school, but they’re going to apply it to a reused glass jar. I tried it last year & it worked very well. Perhaps later on I might get some of them to experiment with what you’ve shown here too. Thank-you for some inspiration Leslie! (Especially welcome as today was the first day of term after Easter).
Thank you Sonya. I think your children would love working with this technique. My Granddaughter and I worked a still life together this way : https://lesliepaints.wordpress.com/2011/07/21/glass-still-life-and-granddaughter/ It was time consuming but well worth the experience. She likes the tactile involvement with collage. She was 5 when she created this one and it was interesting to me that she chose to separate and study each glass form in the still life. I did not discourage her. She was on a mission! 🙂
These are beutiful Leslie! I love the multitudes of brown and the fuzzyness from the paper! Fun fun !
That bottom one draws me, too, Isabelle. It is fuzzy and that seems to only add to the feeling of warmth that I get from it. Thank you! 🙂
I am a sucker for abstract Leslie. But they are great colors.I see you are in the mixed media phase. 🙂
I wish I knew more about abstract and have taken more time to look at more and more abstract srt, Raji. I admit I like watercolor with other media as well as by itself. 🙂 Thank you, Raji!
‘Canopy’ in particular is gorgeous Leslie, the colours and almost collage like texture really work! A triptych of these would look wonderful!
Thank you, Lynda. I like “Canopy” better, myself. I was really “into” that one trying to “read” what it said to me. I think, when an artist gets that lost in their work, some of that effort comes through imprinted in the creation.