Something about lavender, blue and green

Still working...will post as I go.  The lower register will need something a bit more dynamic. This one is about 30" x 40".  No title just yet.

"Tondo" round and "Ovato Tondo" oval paintings

These current round tondos and ovato tondo paintings are experiments in formatting. The terms are from the Italian since the architectural geometric format originated in Rome.  None are titled and they have not been shown anywhere just yet.   I am thinking of scaling up.  The practical design of just how to build the supports is not entirely clear just yet.  The manufactured ones are hoops cut out of sheet material like plywood but do not offer the edge bead that you want in a canvas stretcher support.  Then there are the aesthetic issues of presentation related to scale and body....

I am learning that ovato tondos are not true ellipses, but are ancient Roman in construction, by means of simple geometry with a compass and straight edge.  Excellent illustrations of the process at: http://akwalkerart.blogspot.com/2012/12/how-to-draw-ovato-tando.html.

"When the ellipse is perceived as a deviation from the circle, it pays with a ... to the high-strung ellipse, which plays on the ambivalence of roundness versus ... ellipses by means of two overlapping circles, the so-called ovato tondo.  (From Rudolf Arnheim's The Power of the Circle)

Construction of the Ovato Tondo 

Construction of the Ellipse

I am not certain that the pre-manufactured ovals below are technically ovato tondos or ellipses, but as I understand it, art historically all ovals are called ovato tandos.  They appear a bit more elliptical to me than the relatively more blocky ovate tondos, as constructed above.   When I build supports I might use the old string method with two epicenters...

24" round, acrylic on canvas, 2013

24" round, acrylic on canvas, 2013

8" round, acrylic on canvas, 2013

18 x 24" oval, acrylic on canvas, 2013

18" x24" oval, acrylic on canvas, 2013

18 x 24" oval, acrylic on canvas, 2013

24 x18" oval, acrylic on canvas, 2013

Summer work 2013

I am just back from Santa Ana, Costa Rica where I completed a large mural cycle at the New School of the Integrated Arts (EMAI).  The work is very figurative and may be seen at: http://emaimural2010.blogspot.com.  While there, I also exhibited a series of works started in Spain a year ago, continuing now with these pieces.   Here are some of the works posted all together, representing my studio work for the last year or so (minus a series done with my wife, Isabel).

These first two were just finished on bases started in May.  

Agua Luminosa I,  2013, acrylic on canvas.  48" x 60".

Agua Luminosa II,  2013, acrylic on canvas.  48" x 60".

The Spanish pieces are below.  I kept a separate blog of the process and references for this series at: http://ronmillsdepinyas.blogspot.com.es

La Tramontana Temporal

Meditaciones Visuales en Cataluña

Galería EMAI, Escuela Municipal de las Artes Integradas

Santa Ana, Costa Rica

Junio, 2013

Ronald Mills de Pinyas

Masía amb xiprers a la nit, 2012, acrílico sobre tela, 26” x 36”

This body of work is largely inspired by a sustained residency in Catalonia, Spain.  In it, I sought to work with forms that convey something of the refined and constructed landscape as well as the beautiful natural environment in the context of the depth and drama of the tumultuous and enduring cultural and political history in that part of the world.  More specifically, I was inspired by a particularly massive 10th Century masía stone rural farmhouse in which my wife and I lived and worked, once the home of a famous Almogaver mercenary leader and feudal lord of the region.  I was also inspired by the architecturally varied forms of the finestra (window) as well as the bridges (pont), both intact and in ruin, some from Roman times, others from the Spanish Civil War, some as a result of military attempts to isolate mountain populations, some simply the residue of time. I was also inspired by gracious Catalán rural customs, such as the planting of cypress trees to signify hospitality, and finally the Tramontana winds blowing across northern Catalonia, downward from the Pyrenees to the Costa Brava of the Mediterranean, all metaphors to me of natural and transcultural changes, passageways, transitional spaces alluding to the stubbornness of life and yet its never ending delicacy and wonder.