Continuation to my ‘Koi around’ theme paintings, this time I was conveniently inspired to take action due to a course assignment that fit my old theme.
So for course we needed to do a painting where circle is kind of the ruling form around which the painting should be done, while also considering different mathematical guidelines to proportion the work so that aesthetics is considered. The topic otherwise was free to choose, from more abstract forms to a representative piece.
I immediately thought of my little koi to be circling again, this time within a circle in a circle, not around/towards the circle (Ink painting – Koi Around). Also we were instructed to use ink pencils, but not mandatory. I anyway chose to then make the lines using my Pigma brush pens, unlike in the earlier koi painting. The exact same inks were in use (though just two colors; orange and blue), but used them in more lighter watered down layers. Thus end result is not as vibrant as the earlier painting. All in all, quite different end result to be expected!
I roughly checked position of golden mean (golden ratio), partly with wrong calculation due to my today’s forgetful-squirrel-brain-mode (1,608 vs. 1618 -> oops), with also intentional rounding in the original amount and rounding in each calculated section. So, I just very roughly marked where I would start to draw my first koi.
I did a graphite pencil sketch originally and then the made ink lines (black) and also some changes still to the design while inking. Then I erased all the pencils marks and started coloring first the background and then the koi fishes. I learned a little from my last time; I watered only small sections where I wanted to add the orange, then added lighter watered orange mix and after a while, dabs of more stronger pigment mix here and there. This way I got to keep more of the white in the fish patterns and some smooth variation within the oranges. Luckily the background was a bit simpler also, so I could paint in smaller (pre wetted) sections without drying accidental lines here and there.
Work in progress (ink lines cleaned from a photo in Photoshop), close shots and the final painting:
Soila Art 