Select three subjects. Explore each in four different styles. These parameters—set by David Frederick Riley for his Fall Arts Festival exhibition—offer the artist the opportunity to push his stylistic exploration even farther than recent forays. Four views of a bear, wolf and bison respectively; four investigations of character through composition.
When approaching a blank canvas, Riley often picks one aspect as the guiding principle for the painting, such as line or atmosphere. “To a degree, you have to focus on all elements of the composition in every painting,” he says. “But for me, the painting will vary depending on what aspect I’m focusing on. For instance, if I’m thinking about form and structure, the painting will look different than if I’m thinking more about design. It’s fun to hyper-accentuate one of the fundamentals of art to push into a style.”
