Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Painting on a Deadline

This past weekend I wanted to paint some new pastels for the upcoming 19th Annual Southeast Invitational Miniature Show at Germanton Gallery in Germanton, NC. The show opens Friday, December 2, 2011.

I knew I should probably deliver the two pieces before Thanksgiving. With that schedule I had to make a decision about what to paint and get on with it. Luckily I have many, many photos to choose from and several photos of people that I have singled out as favorites, so I chose two and jumped in.

I began with an acrylic underpainting on an Ampersand pastelbord which is a surface I have never used before. Oh, yeah, I am also one of those people who tries out new recipes on holidays and when guests are coming!

This pastel surface is really nice to work with. I like a sanded surface and this one seemed to be just the right texture for me. The acrylic underpainting helped me get the big shapes and values down quickly and also filled in a lot of area so that I didn't need to be so heavy handed with the pastels.

The keys to what made these two pieces almost paint themselves was this:
  • Taking a different approach from what I normally would use when in a hurry, I slowed down and became very mindful of each stroke I put on the paper.
  • While I was still fresh and focused I worked on the most important areas - the areas of the painting that I wanted to "sing." These included the most contrasting values and the dominant colors. In both paintings it was the area between the heads of the figures and the shapes of their legs and the shadow/highlights on the sidewalk.
  • The supporting cast of receding backgrounds and sideline objects were easy to add once the hard part was done.
  • I did minor touch-ups to each of them once I had them photographed and could see things that could be improved upon, but I resisted my usual urge to FIX things. I have ruined a lot of good work while trying to make it better!

Les Trois Femmes
Fribourg Market Dealer



Details for the show:
Reception - Friday, 5:00pm - 8:00pm
Saturday - 11:00am - 4:00pm
Sunday - 1:00pm - 4:00pm
Germanton Gallery and Winery, 3530 Hwy. 8/65, Germanton, NC 27019

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Foreign Landscapes

Last week I spent five days in a workshop at the Scottsdale Artist's School in Arizona. This was a plein-air to studio workshop in pastels with Marc Hanson. Marc is a wonderful artist and a great teacher too, but I sure did struggle with that landscape!

I tried to figure out why I had so much trouble and I honed it down to a few causes:
  • I am a big shape kind of painter, and other than the obvious big red rocks the size of small mountains sticking up out of the ground, there weren't any big shapes.
  • The vegetation is all very similar in value. How many shades of green-grey, brown-grey, blue-grey, yellow-grey can you put in one painting?
  • I was unfamiliar it.
This Arizona landscape challenged me.

Since the last cause is the only one I can control, I decided that to get the best result from a workshop in an environment with which you are unfamiliar, it would be wise to consider going a day or two early and immersing yourself in the feel of the place and doing some plein air studies.

When I was directing photo shoots in my former life, we would sometimes spend some time doing just that - we called it scouting out the location. I think this would be a good practice for artists planning to spend money and time on a workshop in a place that is new to them.

The sunsets were incredible, but I was way too slow to catch that on a canvas! Marc did it beautifully.
Maybe someday I can do that.