©2017 Marie Marfia The Skelly Dance II, 20.75×28.75″, pastel on paper.
What more appropriate painting for the week of Halloween and Day of the Dead could there possibly be? I can’t think of one either.
This week, all iterations of The Skelly Dance are 25% Off. That means all prints, cards, canvas wraps and the original painting are available at a sweet discount! Sale ends Sunday, November 4, 2018. Happy Halloween! Happy Dia de los Muertos!
So here is my homage piece to Henri Matisse’s The Dance, except, of course, I substituted skeletons for all the dancers, because that’s what I do! Hope you like it. The original pastel painting was lost in an accident at the framer’s, unfortunately. But there is another original available because I had contracted to show the piece in Art Prize Nine and so I re-painted it. Read about that show here.
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The Skelly Dance, WIP
Do you ever get to a point in a project when you just want to be finished? That’s where I am right now. But I know it’s not finished yet. So I’m going to set it aside for a while and figure out what’s bothering me about it and really be done when I say I’m done. I’m close, but there are still lots of parts of this that I’m not happy about. If I didn’t think I could fix them, I’d quit right now. But I can do this.
So you’ll be seeing this one again, but it might take a little while. Some things come clear after you let go of them for a bit. This feels like that sort of project.
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I have begun another in the Old (Dead) Masters series. This is based on Henri Matisse’s The Dance, which is another classic work that I love.
I think what I like best about this painting is the dancing, of course. I also love how their arms make a heart shape. I love the colors, red against cool blue and green. I love that they’re naked. It’s interesting that once I make them into skeletons, there won’t be any way to tell what sex they are.
I did another version of this back when I was in college, but this is the first time I’m tackling it with skeletons. It’s also the largest pastel I’ve ever done. Matisse’s work was around a hundred inches tall by a hundred fifty inches wide. Mine will be 20 x 30″, only a fifth of the size of his. I think about how much canvas he covered and it makes me want to paint really big, too. I swear, before the end of the year, I will find a way to make something enormous-sized. I want to use my whole body to draw.
I’m going for the same primitive feel for my skellies as Matisse used in his painting, so trying to limit the detail. It’s a lot of fun, as usual. Can skeletons ever not be fun?
Here’s some progress shots. More to come, so stay tuned!
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