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| "Muro No 2" Watercolour & ballpoint pen sketch. 21cm x 30cm on paper $240. Peter Kreet |
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| "Muro No.2" Acrylic on board. by Peter Kreet. This painting was developed from the above sketch in the studio. Various textured effects were developed with sand and glazed washes. The original doorway was located just down the street from my apartment in Sintra. See whole exhibition "Fragments of Memory" in earlier posting. |
Portugal is a country obsessed with ceramic title decoration on both buildings and pavements, each town all over the country has its own local pattern. Their overwhelming presence dominates your vision in downtown Lisbon, whole facades of buildings both old and new are covered with decoration becoming to the eye.
I was surprised to learn that many contemporary architects design their own title patterns for new buildings, so the art form is still very much alive.
This overwhelming intrusion into every day life not only brightens up urban landscape, but make it difficult for a stranger, particularly a visual one to ignore. Introduced into the country by the Moors in the 6th cent. the colour and vibrancy of tile decoration has been taken to heart by the Portuguese population.
It is wonderful that in this age of mass production that whole workshops and studios employing twenty to thirty artists are still kept busy designing and hand painting tiles.
Many are quite roughly worked ,while are others have a more controlled even mechanical finish.
Every one to their taste, but all have an individual presence.
 Watercolour Sketch on paper 21cm x 30cm Peter Kreet $240. |
| Watercolour and ball point pen sketch of a traditional Moorish tile patten. Many of these tiles have fallen off their walls over the years. There are workshops specialising in making reproduction for repair purposes, but each is hand painted so as to be honest to the original design. |
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| "Tomar No 2" Details Fragments Blog acrylic and sand on board 700x1000 Peter Kreet. $2400 |
The exhibition I held earlier this year titled "Fragments Of Memory" was greatly inspired by this Portuguese experience. I would spend many hours walking around its towns and cities making rough quick sketches of both the street scape and various patterns, their ceramic embellishment at times looking rather the worst for wear, but still showing a smiling face to the world.
Last week while going through a folder of work I came across a number of watercolour sketches made in Portugal from drawings and later developed into full scale paintings in the studio. As you can see from the examples shown I have not diligently transcribed the sketches into paintings, nor have the watercolours followed the original drawings. I try to make may work a living thing as life is always in a state of flux from one second to the next ,we never know what will happen next so I see no reason to make visual statement that have remained static.
This free approach has allowed me to place tiles were colour may be needed and to control the eye movements of a viewer. What ever the final outcome, I have shown a number of watercolour sketches along side finished paintings so you may to some extent follow their development. In addition as so often happens in our contemporary world [ mind you the ancient one was not much better] the public have made their contribution to the finished works.
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| "Sintra Wall" Watercolour and pen on paper 21x30 Peter Kreet $240. These tiles belong to a Moorish fountain in Sintra. This watercolour has not been developed into a finished painting. |
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| "In Search of Memory" acrylic and sand on board 1000x700 Peter Kreet [details on Fragment Blog] I have used scattered tiles to introduce colour and patten across the painting surface. This helps enliven the work and introduces movement a sense of the unknown beyond the picture frame. |
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| "Water outlet" Watercolour and pen on paper 21x30 $240. I have introduced some defacement onto to titles as tends to happen to public art works over the years. |
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| Title defacement Tomar I have taken considerable liberty in the graffiti Watercolour sketch 21x30cm Peter Kreet |
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| "Fragments of Memory" Peter Kreet $240 Watercolour sketch for painting by the same name. In both works I have used a free random pattern to break up the more mechanical design of a formal treatment. |
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| "Fragments of Memory' see comments above and exhibition blog. |
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| Untitled watercolour on paper to date has not been developed further. |
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| Untitled watercolour needing further development. |
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| "Courtyard fish pond" Watercolour on paper experiment with shadow on title floor |
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| "Search for Time Past" acrylic on board [see Fragments Exhibition blog] |
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| "Street scape" Watercolour on paper 21x30cm Peter Kreet Further experiment of shadows onto tile walls with graffiti |
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| "Evening" $240 Watercolour and pen sketch on paper 21x30cms. Peter Kreet has not been developed further. |
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| "Church in Tomar' Watercolour on paper 21x30cms. $240 Peter Kreet This is a reworking of a boarder pattern in a Romanesque church in Tomar. To date I have not taken the idea any further although I feel it has possibilities for a larger painting. |
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| "Image from the Past" acrylic and sand on board [see exhibition blog] Many titled walls have been worked over or rended with concrete or other materials over time. In addition I have introduces figures from Sumar |
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| Untitled watercolour and pen sketch on paper Tradition Moorish design $240 |
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"Tomar" [see Fragments Exhibition blog] Acrylic and sand on board 100x70cms. Painting by Peter Kreet A work were tiles , Templer Knights Castle and defacement are combined as a contemporary comment . |
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| Tomar Church pattern , Watercolour on paper still to be developed. Peter Kreet 21x30cms $240 |
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