Exploring Light and Mass When Creating Semi-Abstract Art
This week, I show my latest painting and talk about creating semi-abstract art where some details are quite realistic, and others are more abstract. I also give five concrete ideas for creating semi-abstract drawings or paintings.
For the past couple of months, I’ve been working on four “sisters.” They are all the same size, yet each possesses a distinct personality. Halo was the first to be completed. She is the most delicate of the sisters, and perhaps the most beautiful. Fauna is nearly finished, just awaiting the final touches. She is a rule-breaker and a trailblazer who faces the world without fear.
Then there are the two who are still so early in their journey that they only have working titles. I often give my paintings temporary names that may change many times before the final version. The third sister is currently Ikigai, referring to “meaning of life.” She reminds me most of my mother; despite her shyness, she is strong, and though she might wish to blend in, she never truly will. The fourth sister, with the working title Jade, is the only one who has a landscape orientation. As the youngest, she views the world with the brightest, most optimistic eyes.
You will get to see Halo’s sisters once they are finished and photographed. I also always update the new paintings in the gallery page at paivieerola.com.
Light and Mass – Spiritual and Concrete
As an artist, I am fascinated by light. I often feel that once I’ve captured a unique atmosphere and lighting — something you might even call its temperament—the most important work is done.
Beyond light, I think deeply about the physical mass within a piece. In the case of Halo, for example, I contemplated how realistic the vase needed to be versus how abstract I could leave the flowers and other forms. After all, the phenomenon of light carries an inherent sense of mystery.
When light plays, it blurs the line between the concrete and the abstract. Just by looking, it becomes difficult to distinguish what is light and what is physical matter. I believe the same applies to us as human beings: the physical affects the spiritual, and vice versa.
Creating Semi-Abstract Art
This interface between spirituality and reality exists in all art, but it is, of course, most visible in semi-abstract art. Whether it’s a small sketch or a large painting, it’s fun to analyze which parts are tangibly real and which are spiritual in nature.
And when creating, it’s good to stop and think about which parts can remain abstract and which could be more concrete.
I challenge you to look at your own work through this lens! I also have some practical tips for …
Making Your Art More Abstract – Five Ideas to Experiment with!
For simplicity, I’ve used colored pencils and drawn flowers in the examples, but you can apply these tips to any medium and any realistic object.
Vanishing – Let some of the petals fade away so that the flower is partly invisible.
Lightline – By erasing, create a line that travels over the flower. The thickness of the line can vary, and it can also continue on the background.
Living Line – Draw a contiguous line that lives, breathes, and touches your soul. The line can form a part of the object, for example, the center of the flower, or express the object’s spirit and stay in the background.
Echo – Repeat the object so that its color is weaker and its position slightly different. You can also make the echo smaller or bigger than the original object.
Geometric – Include geometric shapes in your organic drawing. A geometric shape can be partly on the top or in the background, or become a part of the object.
I hope these tips inspire you to create semi-abstract art!
Learn more about creating freely – welcome to my courses!
Circulism – Freely with Colored Pencils by Using Circular Motions
This week, I want to bring up a technique called circulism. It’s great for colored pencils when you want to achieve a soft and somewhat vintage look. It’s also a useful technique if you find shading with colored pencils difficult or are hesitant about mixing colors.
In this blog post, I show you how to use this technique to create freely and expressively, without any reference photos or even outlines. You can just pick a pencil and start making continuous circular lines without a specific plan, and let your intuition and imagination take over.
You can also combine circles with other kinds of lines, and thus create different textures that are like meshes on paper.
When you are close to finishing, include sharper lines to reduce the blur in the drawing.
Sounds simple, right? Let’s explore this technique in detail by coloring a mini scenery.
Circulism Tutorial – Mini Scenery Step by Step
Here’s my mini scenery, but yours can have different colors and a different atmosphere. The idea is to draw circular lines with different colors and get soft color transitions and mixtures.
I got the idea for this mini-scenery after I visited Galerie Forsblom in Helsinki to see Petri Ala-Maunus‘s exhibition. His art is based on very small strokes, and the result is stunning and historical-looking. We can achieve a quite similar effect in colored pencil by using circulism.
Step 1 – First Circular Strokes
You only need colored pencils and a small piece of paper. Start by practicing the continuous circular line and, at the same time, marking the corners with different tones. Calm down and keep the circles small!
I have darker and lighter tones of two different colors. When every corner is a little different, either in color or in darkness, it’s easier to get inspired.
Step 2 – Layered Corners
Add some darker neutrals to your color selection. I have black, dark brown, and a little lighter, warmer brown. Add more layers to the corners by making circles with the first four colors and with the new neutrals.
Work on one corner at a time. Make sure that the original color from step 1 dominates, even if you also use other colors. Don’t just color evenly, but create blurry clusters.
Change the orientation of the paper to achieve a more balanced circular mesh. Treat every corner a little differently.
Here you can see how my corners are different. One is very light, for example.
Step 3 – Valley
Add a valley between the lower corners. Draw a route across the landscape and add the horizon. Use circular strokes wherever you can.
Make sure your valley is dark on the bottom. Keep the center blank.
Step 4 – Clouds
Make the sky more expressive. With circular motion, draw clouds by adding contrast and colors to the sky. Remember to keep the color transitions soft.
Step 5 – More Layers
Color more details in the earth and the sky. Color over all the layers so that the coverage becomes better. The sky can have some very smooth and pale parts, and there you can use a white pencil.
Notice the dark lines that define the valley and some trees.
Step 6 – Finishing Touches
Adjust the shape of the blank center area by coloring its surroundings.
Bring in a couple of accent colors to make the color scheme richer.
The Possibilities of Circulism
Try combining circular strokes with different methods to add depth to your art. We usually think about colors and layout, but don’t forget the texture. This enriches your visual language and makes the drawing much more interesting. Softness also brings more depth and adds spirit to your work.
So, when you are working on my colored pencil courses, for example, Intuitive Coloring, you can add some circulism there too!
I Did the Same Drawing Twice!
I rarely sketch my drawings beforehand, but this time I wanted to try something different: creating the same piece twice and recording the process.
The first version was done freely with watercolor pencils. The second was a study of the first, but created using traditional colored pencils. These drawings have many kinds of flowers, including roses and tulips, but I don’t think you always have to know which real flower you are creating; you can have fantasy flowers as well.
Same Drawing Twice – Watch the Video!
When I began the first one, I didn’t have a reference or a model. I simply decided to draw flowers. Watch the video to see how it went!
Which Was Faster?
Both of the drawings took me about the same time—around two hours each. Watercolor pencils are definitely faster for covering the paper, but since I was starting from scratch with the first one, I had a lot of puzzles to solve with the composition and the overall mood. With the regular colored pencils, the process itself was much slower, but since I was just following my first drawing, it didn’t take nearly as much mental energy.
I hope the video inspired you to pick up your colored pencils! I am also curious to know: Have you ever tried an experiment like this?
Try Intuitive Coloring for a simple start to coloring freely, or explore Joyful Coloring if you’re into watercolor pencils. And for those looking to combine watercolors and colored pencils, check out Freely Grown!
Semi-Abstract Floral Still Life: A Painting Inspired by Dutch Masters
This week, I want to show you a piece called Damask. It is a dark, semi-abstract floral painting. I often try to create lighter works because they sell faster, but if it were up to me, I would paint almost only dark pieces.
There is something valuable and very private about dark tones. The painting felt so private that I originally thought about just posting a photo of the finished work and keeping the process to myself. But the purpose of my blog is to inspire you to create. Seeing only the final result rarely inspires as much as seeing the imperfect beginning where everything started.
Inspired by Dutch Old Masters
My painting is about how ornaments can be traced back to nature, but it is also a tribute to 17th and 18th-century Dutch floral paintings. The concept – dark background, lots of details, beauty after beauty – doesn’t leave me alone – it is like a recurring fever.
>> See the blog post “Flower paintings at Rijksmuseum”
And there is only one cure: starting a new dark still life, without references, just by painting freely.
How to Start a Semi-Abstract Floral Painting
At first, I used a broad brush and painted simple shapes with different colors.
Then I decided what flower to enlarge and what to hide. Some flowers appeared, but then disappeared when the painting progressed. I like to think that some flowers are born just to give birth to other flowers.
Why Mastering Technique Is Never Enough
I have noticed technical progress in my work. As things get easier, I can set more challenging goals for myself. However, I don’t believe that art is just about mastering technique, or that painting flowers is only about using them as decoration.
When you start a new work, you create a space around you.
It is a private and special place.
While I was making this piece, I felt like I was in an old room. I could hear the wooden floor creak and the wind blowing behind the old window glass. And yet, I felt I was wealthy. I was far away in the past, but I didn’t feel homesick at all.
The longer I have made art, the clearer my vision has become. Intuitive work is not about copying an image from your mind. It is about your work and your imagination starting to share the same atmosphere.
Here you can see the painting in different stages. Some might please you more, but I was after the special place, remember.
Here’s the finished piece, ready to be photographed.
Your Intuition – Your Private Atmosphere
So, what matters is the atmosphere you want to build. This is why it doesn’t really matter if you paint flowers or faces. From this perspective, all art is abstract. It is not just about thinking of the composition as abstract —it is about the character of each detail and how it connects to your private place (that then opens up to the viewer, too).
Here are some detail pics of my semi-abstract floral painting called Damask.
Friends in Art
Art is a private experience. Through my online courses and videos, I am visiting your private space. I often imagine that we are visiting each other. When the lesson ends, we both return to our own worlds, feeling inspired. It is hard to grow—both technically and as an artist—if you always keep the door closed.
Welcome to my courses to improve your skills and your artistic thinking! If you need more inspiration, feel free to browse my blog archives by date, category, or supply. I have shared my journey here every week for over ten years.