Suzanne Gysin - Paintings and Drawings

Saturday, April 30, 2016

David and Goliath

#619
David and Goliath

Size don't matter,
if you're short,
just use a ladder.
Skill and practice
will make you an artist.
Go home and draw, draw, and draw
then show us the best art we ever saw.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

Sculpture Cast

#618
Reproduction of a cast in clay

In this exercise we copied an existing cast in clay. This is an interesting study for us visual artists.

Tuesday, April 26, 2016

#617
Cast Drawing in Charcoal.

40 x 40 cm
charcoal on paper

The goal of a cast drawing is to copy a white cast as accurately as possible. It means to understand the values of a white cast against a dark background.

Here you see three stages.
The very fist stage is not shown, it is the line drawing.

The first stage here, is the flat shadows. No great value range, just an indication of the light and dark shapes.

The second stage is the "Big Look" which should indicate the darkest and lightest values of the drawing.

The last stage is the fully rendered drawing. There you should see the full range of values, the soft and hard edges, and the modeling of the forms.

Thursday, April 21, 2016

Brantevik Breeze

#611
oil on canvas
55 x 46 cm

This is a day to seize
the Brantevik Breeze.
The fields like a patchwork quilt
and boats in the village built.
I never thought Sweden so green,
I thought it was icey and lean.
Österlen, to my surprise
is as pretty as where the Riviera lies.

sold

Jump

#613
Watercolor
24 x 18 cm

What is more free
than to jump buck naked into the sea.
To leave the clothes behind
rid of all that binds.
To jump so high
you can touch the sky.
Not care where you land
you'll find the soft sand.

Just imagine to be free,
how good it can be.

Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Sweet to tweet

#615
Watercolor on paper
24 x 18 cm

$70 + shipping

Woman

#614
Charcoal on toned paper
80 x 40 cm

Give her sperm and she makes a baby
Give her a house and she makes a home
Give her groceries and she makes a meal.
She is the keeper of life.

Monday, April 11, 2016

Arne's House by the Sea

#610
Charcoal on paper
36 x 48 cm

My neighbor Arne

is old and gnarly.

He's lived by the sea for 80 some years

He's seen high water and plenty of tears.

He knows of the wind from the east

that turns the sea into a wild beast.

He's wise and old

and he has foretold
to calm our fears
that all will be well for another 80 some years.

sold

The Lighter Side of Painting

#612
Watercolor on paper
10 x 20 cm

Friday, April 8, 2016

Figures

#608

Figures

graphite

Nicolas - portrait study (again)

#609
A3
charcoal

Monday, April 4, 2016

Mor - Portrait Study

#607
A3
Charcoal on paper

Saturday, April 2, 2016

Nikolas - portrait studies

#606

graphite and charcoal

A4+

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Master Copy - Portrait

#600
This is a copy of a master drawing, with help from our teacher, Theodora Daniela Capat.

33 x 50 cm
Charcoal on paper

Skull side view

#601
charcoal on paper
A4

Venus of Milo - Bargue copy #2

#603
Bargue Copy #2

A6
Graphite on paper

Bargue Copy #3

#602
My third Bargue copy. The exercise is to take as much time as it takes to exactly copy the original lithograph.

I am not finished with this one, a few hours to go.

graphite on paper
A4

Sunday, February 28, 2016

Artist's Statement

I worked like a dog as an industry cog.
I wrote one thousand five hundred weekly reports,
none of them read by my cohorts.
I was a team player, never a nay sayer.
I had good bosses and bad,
so many meetings it is sad.
I shifted paradigm, and carried the party line.
I did lunches and brunches.
I thought ouside the box,
and did not cross the line.
I had 5-meeting-days,
and a 50-email-an-hour pace
well - all that stress pays.

And one day I stopped, the bubble had popped.
I jumped off the cliff of this financial bliss.

I started to paint and without restraint
I make a world of my own where beauty and compassion is shown.
Colors are bright,
interiors are drenched in sun light,
figures and gestures portraits and textures.

I paint because I have only ONE life,
and when you posess a painting of mine,
you too, have escaped the doldrums of nine to five.

Sunday, February 21, 2016

Moonbath - colored etching

#598
18 x 17 cm
Etching print and watercolor

sold

Sunday, February 14, 2016

Moonbath

#597

A6
graphite on paper

Saturday, February 13, 2016

Ich

#596

A6
Graphite on paper

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

A New World

#595

Graphite

Peeling back the skin
reveals an new world within.

Shiny and clean
not a spot on its sheen
and what do we get
with the new world set?

Junk food is healthy
Unix is friendly
Claculus is easy
Loosing weight is a piece of cake.

Terrorists are happy on Zoloft
the government debt is payed off
Poverty has been eliminated
Dictators erradicated
All software bugs exterminated

It's ideal, comfy, and clean
all we do is watch TV and eat ice cream

But,
one thing that we forgot
this new world, is just not HOT

Thursday, December 24, 2015

The girl: "I've got his wallet."

#594
oil on canvas
23 x 33 cm

Sometimes, things are not what they seem to be.

sold

The Harbor

#593
55 x 46 cm
oil on canvas
sold

We took a kite and attached a camera to it, then we walked down the coast of Brantevik while the kite was about 100 m in the air and the camera took pictures at regular intervals. The reference photo for this painting is from the kite walk. It is the south harbor of Brantevik.

Monday, December 21, 2015

The General's Horse

#592
graphite on paper
A4 (21 x 30 cm)

This is a drawing of a statue in the Glypoteket in Copenhagen. It is not a live horse, but a horse of a warrior from another century.
It is not a happy horse. Today we would say the horse is behind the bit, meaning that his nose is behind the vertical. This usually indicates that the rider has a harsh hand and pulled the horse's nose towards its neck via brute force with the bit, a piece of iron laying in the horses mouth. The open mouth is also a testament to the rider's strong hand, if the mouth were closed, the nose would be even more behind the vertical. This must be very uncomfortable for the horse.
The horse is well muscled and conditioned. It is well groomed and his mane braided for the occasion, and the bridle has a golden trim. The warrior, who is not in the sketch and was broken in the statue, is also dressed in full armor. While majestic the horse also shows pain and oppression.

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

The Slave

#591
Graphite on Paper
A4

This is a drawing of the sculpture "The Slave" by Stephan Sinding, 1913. You can find the sculpture at the Glypoteket in Copenhagen.

The slave has an expression of defiance and fight against his position in life and his oppressors. He is strong, made strong by the physical work he has to do as a slave, and he is oppressed by forces stronger than him. But, we realize that he has a chance at getting his freedom, and with his attitude he is free even though he is physically tied.

The drawing is an original, one of a kind, drawn with led pencil on an A4 page (21 x 30 cm). It ships unframed as shown in the photo.
$70 + shipping
Buy at Etsy

Ludvig van Beethoven

#590
graphite on paper
A4

Bust by Eugine Guillaume, 1870

Beethoven is an inspiring figure. He lived only 56 years and wrote a huge amount of great music. He was also a virtuoso pianist. He lost his hearing when he was 30, and when he was 40 he stopped performing because his hearing was too bad. In the end he was totally deaf. He was already deaf when he wrote the 9th symphony.
Can you imagine writing music without being able to hear it ? He must have had an imagination that was more real than reality. I often think, the worst that could happen to me is to loose my eyesight, I could no longer paint. Maybe I would start to sculpt. Anyway I have outlived Beethoven already.
His funeral was attended by 20,000 people, he influenced millions.