Description
Immersive Lupin is a piece that took me out of my comfort zone by a long way. I make no apology for its busyness and vibrancy as it was a journey. Consequently I learned so much from doing it. It features my wonderful Wife Lupin and is based on reference pictures from attending an immersive Van Gough experience in London in early 2025. It soon evolved as the soft pastel hit the surface of the Pastelmat paper, by using PanPastels as well as soft and hard pastels I found that the shapes from my reference pictures distorted and began to follow their own shapes. But that happened after a difficult start. I had started by doing a sunflower in the style of Van Gough, looking at the way he had used the paint and replicating it in pastels, it was successful but I didn’t like it, it was going to be a Van Gough copy or homage, which I didn’t want. I wanted it to be about Lupin at the experience, engaged with it and part of it. So I restarted, having learnt what I didn’t want and more about what I did.
As it developed, doing the background first and mainly working from the top downwards to avoid smudging it, original shaped changed and I found myself enjoying the flows and directions. Limiting my pallet was important, and the deep red became my accent, Lupins lips, and on the flowery shapes, moving the eye across a complicated narrative in the whole scene. That ‘Narrative’ grew as I went on.
Within the background, but as important as the main figure, Lupin, you may spot two neuron receptors, representing Lupin’s love of learning and teaching, the flow of them is her passion that encompasses this, colourful and definite. Bursting white shapes of emotion, soft and many, interconnectedness of it all, past, behind her and present in front. The past is fading but show shape, some complicated and fit together, others drifting away. One shape in the past I call the autumnal dove, representing the aging process and the lessons learnt/communicated from the past, (it started off as a leaf but took a bird shape as I thought of these things).
Lupin herself is done in a painted style, unlike my previous pastel painting style, this takes her into the moment, the experience and of course, my love for her, ‘the artist paints his wife’.
Original artwork by Bob Iles: Pastels on Pastelmat paper 960mm (w) x 668mm (H)
You are now either reaching for the bucket, or wondering how you might own a copy of this piece:
A limited edition run of just 50 are available to buy, just drop me an email, letting me know what size you would be interested in, at bobilesart@gmail.com and I will get back to you as soon as I can.
