Back to Danae Full-Time, Beam Me Up Scotty!
I Had a Wonderful Time Visiting Collectors and Family and Teaching a Workshop But Now 100% Painting
I finished my Idyllwild Plein Workshop a few days ago, and my Carmel trip a few days before that, but now blessed to have a open calendar and nothing to do but paint.
This part in painting Danae is the technical climax of the light. Most of her unfinished arm is in shadow. The abstract concept is that the last shadows of her hair, shoulder, arm, and chair will "cup" the glow of light coming off her body. As I have in the last days been finishing her hair and her shoulder I can feel it happening.
The lighting concept is that she is the light, the source, the radiating glow. It is a reversal of the Danae legend in which Zeus comes to her as gold or light in Rembrandt's version. The cup of shadow will powerfully accent this affect. In a way this far beyond realism, taking the painting's theme of the subject and merging the theme with the technical element to reinforce each other.
I will finish putting the painting together than then spend several days tweaking the details. For the first time I will hazard a guess about the painting's completion, within 3 weeks. Wish me luck! Beam me up Scotty!
Michael, Idyllwild, 6/14/2021