ABSTRACT PSYCHOSOCIAL ART

By DICK CRISPO

Conversations In The Middle Of The Day

The Black Lines Are My Handwriting

As I approach making the second half of these 30” x 40” paintings on illustration board panels, the important thing for me is to make it clear that the background colors reflect the series’ name. These brighter colors in this series are titled “Conversation in the Middle of the Day.”

While it’s still important for me to put in more lines (drawing), the colors aim to reflect the mood and surroundings. It’s important for me to play the colors against each other. In particular, I like the Bombay fluid inks I’m using because they are very lightfast. They also dry with a seal to them. They impart a shine on their own, so they don’t need to be put under glass.

Dick Crispo art studio - Conversations in the Middle of the Day
Conversations in the Middle of the Day – By Dick Crispo, 2023.

The more and more I find myself drawing with the paint again, something I used to do years ago with my oil paint, I find myself wanting to draw the color. I use fluid acrylics, which are especially perfect for drawing using my brush. In this way, the color can flow or follow along with the black lines. This gives another dimension to drawing within the colors, not only in black line art. The black lines are as much of the story as the color. Together, the color and the black lines become a unit. And it’s that unit that makes the story more important.

Dick Crispo conversations in the middle of the day 01
Conversations in the Middle of the Day – By Dick Crispo, 2023.

It’s the story of the lines in the color, and whatever is going on in the psychology of the painting, in the psyche, is ultimately important. Because these elements are all integral to the psychosocial part of my psychosocial series of paintings. Contrasting the background in the night series painting “Conversations in the Night,” my “Conversations in the Middle of the Day” paintings’ backgrounds are a build-up of different colors. Some subtle, some not so subtle. 

The point in the physical creation of the art itself has to do with the rhythms. It’s something I constantly think about; it’s something I have to do. In many ways, it’s a part of my handwriting. So my handwriting is all over the painting, and the color becomes part of the handwriting with the line art. And that’s very different from saying I’m outlining something. I’m not outlining as much as I’m inlining. By extension, my linework and handwriting are who I am, right down to my nervous system. It all extends from within, creating art or capturing a moment of my identity.

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