I finally opened my etsy shop for smaller scale studio work and compositions that keep accumulating. You can find the etsy shop here. At the moment the shop has original oil paintings – mostly on paper. Have a look and enjoy!
Krys Robertson
Artist (Painter)
A lot of stuff happened last year that was just too hard to swallow. In the course of it, my painting routine went completely over board. Finally last month I slowly crept my way back into a routine by doing smaller paintings first – postcard sized. Here are a couple of them.
Krys Robertson. Youth, one eye closed, with red striped jumper. Oil on prepared paper. 2015. Postcard sized.
Krys Robertson. Old Manison (Gutshaus Carlshoehe). Oil on prepared paper. 2015. Bigger postcard size. 17.5 x 15 cm
Krys Robertson.
Krys Robertson. Ulmer Fischermarsch („Leck me henda, leck me vorna, leck me kreizweis am Arsch“). … March of the Ulm Fishermen (with an untranslatable verse that boils down to a florid version of “kiss my arse/sod it”. Oil on prepared paper. March 2015. 17.5 x 15 cm
Krys Robertson. Half nude on yellow. Oil on prepared paper. 2015. Postcard sized.
Krys Robertson. Church. Oil on prepared paper. 2015. Postcard sized.
Krys Robertson. Woman with red hair, bust. Oil on prepared paper. 2015. Postcard sized.
Krys Robertson: Bust, Tulips. 2015. Oil on prepared paper. 38 x 46 cm (width x height)
Everybody seems to have been sick in the last couple of weeks and I didn’t escape either. Running to catch the tram yesterday I felt so very alive again. Battered, but not broken. And with some energy returning to the limbs I gathered what I found for a still life.
Merry Christmas and may 2015 be a good one!
Krys Robertson: Peaches and Figues on Blue Tablecloth. Oil on paper. 21.5 H x 31.5 W, 2013. Available on Saatchi
Tagged: still life
I just found this wonderful post about the “Book of Wonders” from the University of St Andrews. I love book illustrations – especially about scary monsters! Imagine what treasures are hoarded in all those libraries that no one sees. I shall play with these illustrations!
‘Island of Tin, plagued by dragons,’ from 17th or 18th century manuscript copy of “The Book of Wonders of the Age” (St Andrews ms32(o))
We have always referred to this manuscript (St Andrews ms32(o)) as the ‘book of wonders’ and indeed wondered what it was all about as it is lavishly and confusingly illustrated, packed with mysterious monsters and people doing strange things, but as it is written in Persian we could never be certain what it was all about. Now I have had the help of an Iranian student, Fatemeh Salimi, to try to make sense of it. While an Islamic art historian could tell a lot more about the images that I can, the illustrations are so fabulous that they are worth reproducing here even if I haven’t got their interpretation quite right.
A rabbit with a human head from 17th or 18th century manuscript copy…
View original post 1,048 more words
Krys Robertson: Japanese Girl With Red Bow, Oil on Canvas, 2014
I noticed a while ago that my using photo references for my paintings has become a burden to me. While that is fun and very useful at times, something changed radically over the last couple of weeks. I got a photo reference hangover. I felt dead inside and wanted to curl up somewhere being miserable at the thought of doing “another painting”. It just felt strangling. Strangely that hangover kicked in when I painted the Japanese girl, which I sketched last year on a Tokyo subway and then took a secret photo as a reference. I actually liked the outcome, it is quite transformed from the reference. Though I kept getting the response of “is she picking her nose?” to which the answer is “no, she’s just reading and thinking – without picking her nose”. But still the photo reference hangover was overwhelming.
Krys Robertson: Still Life with Mangosteens and Spring Onions. Oil on Canvas, 2014 (preliminary version). 20 x 61cm
So here was the challenge: a month of cold turkey… back to the roots, back to life, back to painting and drawing from life. And only from life. I started with the bad weather solution … still lives. The two shown here are preliminary versions … I nearly always come back and change round things in my paintings over time as they stand around in my studio.
Krys Robertson: Still Life in Green (Pears in Green Bowl). Oil on Canvas, 2014 (preliminary version). 20 x 61 cm
It doesn’t quite matter if things work out in the end to become a good painting, but at least I feel alive again when I paint.
Portrait of Lyddi in Blue (sneak peek of what I am working on for the upcoming show)
Readers, this is exciting for me, so if you happen to be in Hong Kong, please pop into our next group show from 1-8 December 2013. There shall be a weekend friendly pre-dinner Saturday opening from 4-7pm with some drinks. Further infos below.
Intimate —- Distant (A joint exhibition of 4 Hong Kong artists Fonny Lau, Jay Lee, Debe Sham and Krys Robertson)Opening: 30 November 2013, 4-7pm
Exhibition duration: 1 – 8 December 2013
Venue: Koo Ming Kown Exhibition Gallery Communication and Visual Arts Building Hong Kong Baptist University 5 Hereford Road, Kowloon Tong
MTR Kowloon Tong Exit A2, 6-7 min walk Link to the Facebook event page
We are all working on new work to fit the theme “intimate – distant”. After having done Hong Kong landscapes for the last show this time I will focus on people. So I work on portraits of families and their individual members. There is a recurrent theme of parents and children in there. However I do not want sugary images, rather something more holistic and carefully observed.
Please come… all artists will be at he opening!
