FINISHED PAINTING! "The Basilist; Pesto Change-o"

I'm finally calling it! After adding many many many little shadows, on the basilisk, on the table, into very faint reflections.

The still makes me think of a still-life project I had in art class in highschool. We were told to only paint in daubs of colour, as the impressionists often did, like Monet. Instead of looking at an object holistically, to break it down visually into light and colour. I blended the still here much more than I was allowed to during that project, but the reflective surface reminds me of the set-up we were given. A shiny urn on a patterned cloth, which reflected in a complicated way. I think that painting was lost in the house fire, which is a shame.

I've tried to displace some of the visual clutter by adding small items along the visual edges of the table. A clear stone up by the books, a piece of jade on the bottom left of the table, and a ring on the bottom right, which obviously the basilist needed to remove to do messy food alchemy.

I based the recipe on what I use for pesto. I may already have mentioned in a previous post, but I use sunflower seeds as an alternative to pine nuts, which are hideously expensive. I've tasted it with pine nuts, the flavour is not altered enough to be worth the extra $50 in the recipe. I could easily start here about the classism in the food industry, but I shan't, because classism is in every industry, and I already wrote three sketches about it in my upcoming Fringe play. I need to keep my frothing rage contained inside funny sketches, like little demon hamsters in wheels that create electricity.

(Aside: I have no idea if that visual makes sense. One of the many games I played as a youngster was a computer puzzle game called 'The incredible machine'. You have X-number of odd items, like a trampoline, a ball, a hamster, etc. And of course, a goal, say, to get another ball into a net or something, and each item had a unique effect that you had to use in tandem to create a domino effect once you run the machine. The hamster sits on a treadmill in a box with a conveyor belt, and doesn't move until it's jostled by something. When it does, the belt starts moving, and anything that touches it is moved along on the energy the hamster creates.)

Back to the recipe - the rest of it is pretty straight forward. I really want to try alternative herb pestos this year. I love basil pesto, but imagine oregano pesto!

The other note in this piece, is that I've decided to start trying to cameo figures from other pieces I've done in the past:

I'm beginning to create an entire world of characters. I grew up on games, rpgs, novels, and pure fantasy. When I moved to Toronto to live with my aunt and uncle for a year or so, I think they legitimately thought I lacked intellect, because, one, of my lack of social skills, and two, almost my entire life experience was around religious abuse and fantasy. Looking back, I can see how I might have given an airhead impression to most people at the time. The social skills especially took a lot of work to pick up. I'm not sure I've really got them, yet.

So this is a calling. A fusion for me between painting and writing. Long-form visual poetry.

And now, the progress shots that brought this piece together.

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