Dmitry Fesechko in the spotlight

Today's interviewee is Dmitry Fesechko. Thank you for sharing in.
Spotlight are short interviews to introduce some of the artists here at Putty&Paint.

Who are you? Tell us a bit about you.

My name is Dmitry, I live in Moscow, Russia, now I am a freelance artist. As many artists I studied law (there is some trend, isn’t it?) in university, my graduation work was dedicated to copyright law. I always liked art and at the same time when I was studying law I began to draw and paint. When I began to paint, I was really fond of abstraction and pop art and avant-guard ... Mostly because I really did not have any thoughts and ideas about how to work with form. So I tried to work with color, to mix paints, to make something abstract… And then the truth appeared to me - abstract art is not so easy thing as it seemed to me. I also began to paint miniatures, and you know, many people start to paint miniatures when they want to make their own army for tabletop gaming, but it was not so for me. For me from the beginning the miniature painting was art. Then some of my paintings were sold, I began to take commissions on painting miniatures and then I realized that this is what I really want to do.  After I graduated from university I began to take some private lessons from one good old artist. I studied anatomy a lot, academic drawing and so on. I also had some training on concept design. I have even worked for some time in one animation project, as a background artist but I really didn’t like working when you have an art director over you, detailed description what you need to do and so on. Now I’m painting miniatures, making paintings, taking part in some exhibitions and enjoying such life.

What are your favorite tools, and why do you use them?

I really like oils a lot. Good oil paints are made of natural pigments and the colors really have a very natural look. It is easier to work with large surfaces on miniatures and to make some freehands (but not the patterns – for patterns I use mostly acrylics) with oils. But painting in oils has some negatives too. You really need to have a good experience to predict the result because when you lay down the paint it is very shiny. Also you need to use varnishes, to wait some time when oil dries.  As acrylic paints I use Vallejo, games workshop and andrea paints. In fact I don’t have a large pallete of acrylic paints, the habit that comes from working with oils. I very much like to mix colors. I also have an airbrush – H&S Infinity, but I don’t use it much, I don’t like the “glamour” look of works where airbrush is used a lot. I use kolinsky (best for acrylics for me) and synthetic brushes. 

How would you describe your own style?

I like realistic looking painted miniatures and I really don’t like miniatures painted In kind of comic book looking style and too much stylized. There are some good artists using stylization a lot and their works are really awesome but I just like the realism more. I try to use vivid colors carefully, but also try not to do “only earth neutral colors miniatures”. I Don’t think that I can describe my own style in miniature painting itself and I don’t know if it is unique, but I like to do freehands, spend some time designing it, I like the realistic looking pictures on miniatures, like some soft edges on freehand drawings.

Show us your workspace. Do not clean it.

Who influences your work and what inspires you?

I think it is really better when nobody influences your work. Really. And no other works should inspire you. You should be inspired by your emotions, which you get from other works, but not those works itself, there is difference.  Other wise you’ll be making replicas and can lose yourself. So a lot of emotions which I am inspired by I get from classical art. My favorite period is 19th century. I very much like orientalists, like Lecomte du Nouy. I have a very good book – Orientalism in western art, there are about 1000 orientalism art works from different periods. Vasiliy Vereshchagin (Василий Верещагин if you want to google it) is a really awesome Russian orientalist artist (although he was a soldier he fought in Asia all of his life). I really like works of Caspar David Friedrich, Peter Arbo, and of course Russian artists – Konstantin Makovsky (Константин Маковский), Vrubel (Врубель). Modern Russian artist Pavel Ryzhenko (Павел Рыженко) is also really awesome.  And of course many many many others. Also I very much like the Spectrum annual artbooks. So the emotions is what really inspires us, I think.

What’s you current favourite music/movie/series you enjoy while working?

I like documental historical films, like travelling channel, like audiobooks (some of last – John Fowles – The Magus, Haruki Murakami - 1Q84). I like different music – classical rock like Led Zeppelin or Jefferson Airplane, Nick Cave and Tom Waits. One of my favorite bands is Morphine.

Show and tell us what you are currently working on or what you recently finished?

All the works I recently finished are here – on Putty and Paint: Samurai bust, Time composition, S’erum and Knights. I really should mention that all of them were done for Russian Alternative contest. There is also my last painting (though it was done in the beginning of this year) “Time Smoker” on the photo and one painting I’ve just started. It should be still life in classic glazing technique – some robotic mask or something like this ) I also just started some miniature projects – giant (and there would be archers with him I think and somebody killed) and model from Warmachine (If I’m right), hope I’ll finish them (cause sometime I don’t finish what I’ve started).

Regards,
Дмитрий

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Visit Dmitry Fesechko at Putty&Paint and on his Website fesechko.com