Ken Manninen
In pursuit of my inner artist

Blog

(posted on 16 Nov 2017)

It is high time I got back to updating my site.  Watch for updates, including some of my recent artistic renderings.

I am just back from another workshop with Jean Haines at ArtEscapesYVR in North Vancouver.  I continue to be inspired by her work and her approach to painting.  Since the first of her workshops that I attended I have taken a few other workshops with other artists and have done some individual study that have really helped me to start to understand where I want to focus my art.

I have been practicing human figure drawing as well as Chinese brush painting and am finding I do appreciate art that tells a story and that is not photorealistic.  I do love painting detail but find it impedes my artistic expression.  That is why I am drawn to the work of Jean Haines as it has detailed components but is generally very free and expressive.

In summary I am hoping to focus more on paintings that incorporate human figures and that are freer and leave more to the imagination of the observer yet still have an area of detail.  Technically, I hope to be more conscious of incorporating a greater value range as well as a greater diversity in my brushwork.  Let's see how that goes.