Ken Januski has been a painter most of his artistic life. During undergraduate and graduate years he spent almost all his studio art time on painting. He started off with acrylic and used only it for about 10 years. Then he switched to oil, his first real use of it, for another 5 years or so. When he left his live-in studio for the house where he now lives he at first stopped painting entirely.
How could he paint his 6'x8' paintings in the small room that was now his studio? These space constraints probably had something to do with his first painting forays in the house being small watercolors. Those space constraints probably also had something to do with his experiments in hand-printed prints, his main medium for the last 10 years.
But printmaking seemed to require more and more planning, especially when he turned to moku hanga. During the early covid lockdown in the spring of 2029 he all of a sudden felt like returning to painting, but this time on a much smaller scale. He also returned to acrylic since he didn't want to use the solvents that oils required in the house.
With one exception, not shown here, he did no acrylic painting for over 25 years! But when he returned to it, even on the much smaller scale, he found it invigorating. The examples below are in pretty much chronological order, starting with the newest.
Particularly in the newest one, immediately below, he's beginning to feel comfortable both with acrylic painting and with the mixture of realism and abstraction in the overall composition. Oddly this painting began with digital sketches of a relatively rare Red Phalarope, seen in September 2021 and proceeded to a digital painting. That in turn led to the painting below.
Though painting has been quite liberating he continues to work in moku hanga as well. Acrylic painting and moku hanga are now his primary media.
Red Phalarope at Wissahickon Waterfowl Preserve. 12x16 inch Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2021. |
Pine Warbler and Ring-necked Ducks at Morris Arboretum. 9x12 inch Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2021. |
Whimbrels at 2-Mile Landing. 9x12 inch Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2020. |
Stream Bluets at Papermill Run. 9x12 inch Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2020. |
Blackburnian, Canada and Black-throated Green Warbler. 12x9 inch Acrylic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2020. |
American Redstart, Black-throated Blue, Northern Parula. 12x9 inch Acyrlic Painting by Ken Januski. Copyright 2020. |
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