Schrag Ping Pong Painting: Introduction

I’ve heard that one of the most insidious side effects of the current pandemic is loneliness. Apparently the behaviors that are best for our body - wearing a mask,  washing your hands frequently, using a hand sanitizer, and social distancing - aren’t all that good for our emotions. We get angry, resentful, and as I said, lonely.  It is natural that we turn to our digital tools to attempt to blunt the loneliness. Problematically, much of the chatter going on in digital space seems to be discussing the pandemic or the upcoming elections - discussions or rants that are anything but calming.

I am going to offer an alternative. If you are getting this email you are on the mailing list for Schrag Wall.  I will use that same list to distribute the posts for Schrag PPP.  The PPP stands for Ping Pong Painting, a process that I have chatted about with some of you off The Wall list. The PPP images are my latest take on the second tenet of Distilled Harmony - Enable Beauty.  They are the result of a lifelong negotiation between my love of painting, drawing, photography and the - truth be told- the sad fact that I can’t draw. I have tried, and can keep pace with modestly competent 8 year-olds. But recognizable people, pets or places? Ain’t gonna happen. I will however claim to be a rather accomplished doodler. I mean think about it. I spent years and years sitting in classrooms listening to lectures. What’s a guy to do? Assuming you want to at least appear to be paying attention? You keep your pen moving across the page. You doodle. So when I say I am currently focused on taking photographs that lead to drawings, I really mean I am focused on taking photographs that lead to good spaces for multi-colored doodles.

Briefly, here is the PPP process. I take a photograph. This is the first step in Ping Pong Painting - the serve if you will. 

Next I pull a digital version of the photograph into my computer and open it in Photoshop or Gimp or some other graphics program. I decide what part of the image would make for interesting doodles. I remove that part of the image, leaving a blank space. This is the return of serve.

Next I print out the image - or have Staples print it out for me, as they do a good and inexpensive job of creating this step up to about 11x17 inches. This creates a sort of coloring book version of the photograph - the photograph with my chosen blank spaces.  Volley the return of serve.

Now I fill the blank spaces with black and white doodles.  Again, sort of like coloring book images.  Volley back.

Another volley - I color those portions of the image with markers or pencils or whatever, creating a version of the original photograph whose relationship to the original photograph is somewhat ambiguous. Here is an example that is what you will

see in every Schrag PPP post.

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The photograph - AKA the serve.

Here is the original photograph, take in Venice, July 7, 2018

Return of serve. 

The original photograph cropped with the coloring spaces removed. 

Volley.

I am discovering that I don’t always save the various volleys.  Searching them out is rather complicated. I will try to do a better job.

Designs created in the coloring spaces.

Final volley.

Designs painted.