Painting Experiments

The digital investigations led naturally to painting. I chose acrylic paint for its speed of drying, flexibility in layering, and capacity to shift between translucent washes and opaque impasto. Early experiments tested stippling and glazing to mimic panic-like distortions such as tunnel vision and visual static.

Painting also brought unpredictability. As Elkins (1999) notes, paint “thinks” with the artist: accidental textures and residual marks became active contributors to atmosphere. Through trial and error, I discovered that scraping and layering could create the compressed, suffocating sensations I had sought in digital space.

Painting Outcomes: Different Typologies of Fear
Two major acrylic paintings emerged from this phase. Both paintings confirmed that the emotional charge of digital environments could be translated into painterly form. Texture, gesture, and chromatic opposition became the means of staging fear on the canvas, intensifying affective response through material immediacy.