Contemporary none-objective painting by Maxim Grunin

Sunset Memory, 30"X40", oil on canvas, 2010

Even though my work has the unique qualities that belong to my personal method of painting, I am inclined to look at it's similarities with the works of the famous artists. Knowing about the origins of my work helps to understand it's relationship to art History and art practice. My paintings are reminiscent of the Abstract Expressionism that originated in the late 1940s in America. Mark Rothko's color field painting is evident at the base of my work. The soft blending of the tinted colors in my paintings is not a direct borrowing of the images of the master. It has a lot more of my intention to create moody atmospheric appearing surface in the background. I am not concerned with the bold color statement but rather with the viewer's eyes reading the transition of quiet colors. Wilhelm de Kooning's dynamic action painting is visible in my work as well. The unavoidable lively marks on top of the smooth ground in my paintings result from the vigorous strokes of a palette knife and a brush. Jackson Pollock's drip painting emerges when the paint is thrown and splattered across the canvas. I achieve a composite of several modes pioneered by the great masters of the past.

Making Of An Abstract Painting In Pink by Maxim Grunin. Step 1

I've already primed and stretched the canvas. Now I need to mix a variety of colors for my new abstract pink painting and cut the paint with linseed oil in order to make it blend smoother. I do the blending with a soft wide brush. It allows for exquisite mist like looking paint surface. The mixing and some of the painting  is done with a palette knife. The best way to quickly and efficiently mix paint is to move the knife in a round motion, clockwise or counter clockwise. That's why the batches of paint of my palette look like swirls.

Once I mix all of the grades of pinks that are in fact red and yellow tints, I begin to apply the paint onto my canvas. There is a warm, subtle orange that I used as an under-painting for this piece. The medium, especially oil paint, is translucent. The warmth of the orange layer will add even more subtle depth from underneath the pink layer. The color of the under-painting will also share it's properties with what is painted on top of it. Remember how hard it is to paint white over black, it will not get white until several coats of white are applied. That's because black keeps showing through. This time my work will have an increased overall warm color scheme. I have a goal in mind and it is to create a "pink" painting. I want to have a gradient of lighter and darker pink tones. I begin to apply the background coat onto a primed sanded canvas.