Several Layers of the Scraped and Sanded Underpainting

Like almost all of these paintings, Newark starts out with several layers of scraped and sanded colors.  This underpainting was a bit different here, however, since I knew I wanted the sign to be a divided-color sign; the types of information on a highway sign is indicated by the color field surrounding the text.  In this case, the green coding of the destination information would be hard-edged by the blue of location information.

When I was in high school I liked the industrial band Laibach.  Little did I know that there was much more to the group than I knew as a 15 year old snot-nosed punk.  Later, after university I learned more about the group and their connection/manifestation as the music-faction of the avant-garde arts group Neue Slovenien Kunst (NSK).  If Laibach was the musical component, Irwin is the visual arts component.

My respect for NSK -who they are and what they’ve accomplished as artists- has grown with each project I learn about.  A reference to them (and Irwin) in the underpainting  is just a cheesy homage.

Hitting the homage lettering a little hard for what would ultimately be just underpainting.

Red Layer Text Underpainting

I started to get a little carried away with the red underpainting.  I originally intended to have red underpainting only in a few areas.  I guess I just liked the blood red dripping as things developed and wanted to put it everywhere.

Some candy pink to start the lightening for the lettering.

Decided to go from a girly pink to a baby boy blue.

The final textual underpainting was done in a baby blue to contrast the pink underneath and to give the intended white a more solid-footing.  Although I really like the color, I was thinking that something would be missing, so I decided to flip the painting and turn it at an angle, that way if there were drips, they would ultimately streak in an upward, launching direction (once turned right-side-up).  I went in the direction of the plane logo to add to the sense of upward motion; of getting the fuck outta Newark.