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“Wilson developed a rigorous method for painting skies in his large scale dioramas that had its roots in his plein air paintings. While painting outdoors, he would carefully blend progressive tints of his three main colors, the horizon, mid-sky, and upper sky, into a graduated, light-filled sky color.
“In a typical diorama, Wilson carefully planned the sky colors and usually painted with thirteen bands of color. These colors were pre-mixed to the determined quantity so there would be no color matching midway through the painting of the sky.”
In Wilson’s own words:
“A typical fair-weather sky, especially at high altitudes, graduates smoothly and evenly from a deep blue (cobalt or ultramarine) overhead, to a clear and much lighter blue, usually a turquoise hue, at perhaps one quarter of the distance from the horizon to the zenith. Below this level the tone usually lightens still more, but the blue color is modified by ground haze.
"The hue may be somewhat greenish, in very clear weather, or purplish, on hazy days, especially at low altitude. These three tones—upper part of the sky, clear turquoise band and horizon color—may be considered as the key colors for the entire sky. If they are carefully prepared, all the intermediate tones may be obtained automatically by mixing these. This will insure a smooth, even gradation. The process of repeated subdivision naturally results in 13 bands, as the following diagram will indicate."
Last week, National Public Radio reported that the FBI has been reassessing its investigative methods after failing to anticipate the unrest in the Arab world. Instead of using just covert tools, they’re now turning to Google Trends, checking, for example, when Egyptians started searching the word “Tunis.” Google Trends gives you a rough idea of what people are thinking about, based on how many times they search a topic. If you compare the graph of search volume for pop stars, it’s clear that “Lady Gaga” (orange line) has quickly risen far above either “Madonna” or “Eminem.”
All sorts of fantastic beings are hot right now, especially, “vampires.” “Zombies” came back from the dead a few years ago, gobbling up “fairies.”
“Steampunk” is chugging steadily ahead. People run hot and cold on “plein air” painting, depending how nice the weather is outside in the Northern Hemisphere. ---------- Google Trends NPR report
5 Comments on Lady Gaga, steampunk vampires, and fair weather painters, last added: 3/29/2011
Does the last chart show not only the effect of the seasons on many outdoor painters, but does it also show the effect of a bad economy on them, too? The lower spikes after 2006 seem to coincide roughly with when the economy began to go downhill.
Can we learn anything from how the Steampunk graph shows growth during the same bad economy, when concept art, plein air, and performance art all show decline?
Do vampires and Lady Gaga have something in common???
The uptick in the steampunk graph was one thing I noticed. I have been predicting for about 5 months that as far as a genre (Ex.Harry Potter, Twilight and Vampires), Steampunk is going to be big by the end of the summer.
I have been working bit by bit on a Steampunk style story for sometime, but being an artist not really a writer, it's slow goings. I hope the wave of Steampunk interest will still be rolling in and when I get it finished, that aside mark my words it's coming.
One of the most secluded and magical places in the USA is the Kalalau Valley on the island of Kaua'i, It's the basin visible at the base of the sheer cliffs in this 8x10 inch plein-air painting from 2000.
No roads lead to the valley. You reach it by getting a permit and and hiking in along the narrow Na Pali trail, which follows the coast.
The mountain walls rise up almost vertically from the valley. It’s inhabited by wild goats and chickens, and a few campers. At times in its history it’s been the home of a small society of people living entirely off the grid, beyond the reach of law and custom. ---- Wikipedia on Kalalau Valley
7 Comments on Kalalau Valley, last added: 3/27/2011
Me and my fiancee booked our permits last week. We are hiking the Na Pali to Kalalau in early September, for our honeymoon. I plan on bringing lots of drawing supplies. I'm curious how long you spent on the trail? We are planning on doing 3 days heading into Kalalau and then (hopefully) arranging to have someone pick us up by boat from there. That way we will be able to spend some time hiking around other parts of the island as well. In your experience do you think that will work out well enough?
Also, I received my books in the mail this week. I can't even begin to describe the huge smile that has been permanently affixed to my face since opening the package. First off, the way you personalized my books had me so flattered and flabbergasted I really wasn't sure what to do with myself. My partner in crime has not yet seen his copy yet (its going to be a surprise). And then when I actually started reading beyond the title page--- all I can say is thank you so much. Thank you for writing such an informative tome. This is the book I have been wishing for since my days studying at Parsons. And even though we have yet to meet, thank you for being a wonderful teacher and mentor. From the first page to the last, your book inspires me to CREATE! Once again, I thank you.
Christian, that photo is amazing--and keeps me honest!
Marc--have a great trip. I only hiked part way in on the Na Pali trail because we only had one day for the hike. The view of course is from a whole different road that takes hours to get to after leaving the Na Pali trailhead.
My only advice is to take a raincoat, and don't do what I did--(leave the convertible top down in the parking lot). It's the rainiest spot on earth.
Really beautiful to see one of your plein air pieces James.. this is fantastic.. thanks for posting! Also very interesting to see compare the photo and see how accurate your drawing ability is, though the painting blows the photo out of the water with it's own sense of life!!
Thanks, everybody for your interesting comments about the recent post “Moving Out.” It was a little experiment in form, combining a plein air study with fictional story. Sometimes I paint a house and think of it as a stage where a million private dramas are played out.
Tom, as far as the technical details, it’s in a Moleskine watercolor sketchbook, so it’s about 5 x 7.5 inches. I started with a pencil drawing and laid in an ochre undertone for the sky. I was going to going to come back with a blue wash, but forgot to, and liked it better warm.
I laid some color down over the whole surface of the paper, saving out the shining tarp and the little bit of snow by the fence, which were the lightest notes. In some of the early passes, I floated the dark tones for the windows onto wet paper to let them bleed into the surrounding tone.
Even after the first pass, the house needed to be “dirtied up” to look old. The truck was an ultramarine blue underwash with a semi-opaque light red laid over. The tree branches are mostly drybrushed, with branches added in pencil. Mario, some of the fine lines (clapboards and wires) are drawn in with a Caran d’Ache colored pencils.
The whole sketch took about an hour and a half. In the composite at the top of this post, I stuck a photo of the subject at the right so you can see how the camera saw things. The far semi tractor-trailer in the photo was in motion during the photo. And the pickup really did leave halfway through, so I had to rely on memory to finish it up. I did all the work on location; I almost never work on a study after returning home because I feel unplugged from the inspiration.
6 Comments on Answers to your questions on "Moving Out", last added: 3/24/2011
Thanks so much, James, for such a great run down of the process. I love (among other things) how your composite photo shows how you edited out certain things, such as the van.
"...unplugged from the inspiration." Great phrase, and great little watercolor.
Thanks for the thorough recap of your method. Don't know if you want to say more about this piece, but I wondered about the rectangular area in the street, from the truck's front wheels forward. It seems to be a purposeful change in hue and temperature; from a cool gray under the rest of the truck -- and behind it -- to this warmer, yellower patch. Is it that the light in most of this area is completely unblocked by the truck?
The old house stood beside the railroad tracks. A satellite dish turned its ear to the dead sky. Some of the windows were covered over with clapboards, like blind eyes. A freight train rumbled by, screeching and grinding.
A man came out of the house. He lifted a TV into the back of the pickup. Then he loaded in a chair and a table. He stretched a black plastic tarpaulin over the load and tied it down, jerking the rope and muttering. The black tarp shimmered in the March sunlight.
A woman leaned her head out of the door. “Get lost,” she yelled. “I don’t care if I never see you again.” The door slammed. A turkey vulture circled overhead.
I sat on the sidewalk across the street, painting quietly. Cigarette butts were scattered beside my feet.
The man got into the truck and started the engine. The train passed and the crossing gates lifted. The truck roared across the tracks.
A half hour later the woman came out, wiping her eyes with her sweatshirt sleeves. She walked by, pushing a baby carriage, slowing down a little to see what I was doing.
Speaking of stories, I received the book I bought from you and my wife showed me your inscription. We were using Skype as I'm overseas. Thanks for reading my story on the order form and responding to it. I appreciate the encouragement!
The painting is wonderful. I came over from Dan's where he wrote a nouvelle 55 prompted by your painting, prompted by my new little genre! You just never know where these artistic expressions, out of sobering stories, will take us!
You really know the secrets of light, these subtle effects are particularly difficult with watercolor. Also, I love the almost invisible details like the "stripes" on both the roof and the walls.
I'd love to hear a bit more about the process behind this painting, James, if you wouldn't mind. For example: what's the size of this one? Also, did you lay in the subtle ski color first?...And anything else you care to share about the process.
Your watercolor, and your attraction to bleak neighborhoods, reminds me of a woman I once knew. She was an amazing watercolor portrait painter. Mary always wanted to paint portraits, and so she read and studied as much as she could about the technique and medium. She told me she spent years mentally painting peoples portraits in her minds-eye, visually examining their faces and mentally painting her patients, co-workers, and strangers. She didn’t start painting until she retired from nursing, and then… BAM… she started painting as if she had done it all her life! Fantastic and beautiful watercolor portraits! A real pro! She had no trouble getting commissions, but she hated the tame, refined and manicured portraits her clients wanted. Her favorite sitters were street people… homeless men and women, home-boyz, hustlers, working-women, and day-laborers. She would set her easel up near where the workers would gather and pay them ten-bucks to sit for her. As she worked they would tell her their stories, she would listen and paint the most incredibly sensitive and dignified portraits you can imagine. She worked here in Pasadena, California, for many years until her eyesight failed her. When she couldn’t paint anymore she started making art-masks, but her heart wasn’t in it, and she passed away a few years ago from Parkinsons. Some of her work hangs at the senior-center here, and she and her husband published a book of her portraits. Her name is Mary Heussenstamm and I am grateful to have known her and to have called her a friend. Thanks for the Journey, Jim. –RQ
Beautiful painting! The house is like a character itself. I see what you mean by sparking many stories. I also share your interest in bleak neighborhoods! Nice, James.
Thanks, everyone. Steve, I wasn't even aware of that color temperature change until you mentioned it. I was moving pretty fast, but the guiding thought was to vary warm and cool within the narrow range of this subject. In photos surfaces often appear flat and unvaried, but I find a little random variation helps, and I suppose that was what I was doing intuitively.
Thin channels of snow linger in the tractor ruts on a clear March day.
After I painted the scene on location, I set up the painting in front of the scene itself, angling the painting to try to match the light levels.
Trying to match a painting up with a camera view was the challenge faced by pioneering movie matte painters. One early technique, called a “glass shot” involved painting part of a scene onto a pane of glass positioned vertically in front of a camera. That way you could place a castle or some other structure in the scene adjacent to the filmed action.
If you want to play with this idea, it helps to have a panel that’s a little wider than the easel (in this case an 11x14 panel on an Open Box M pochade easel).
Also, the illumination on the painting has to be just right. My painting is shown in direct sunlight, but I often use a white umbrella to diffuse and control the light on the painting, especially when painting contre jour (facing the light source). In any kind of observational painting it really helps in color mixing if you can match illumination levels as much as possible.
And speaking of blending in, check out how this Chinese artist does it. --------- The second photo is of Paramount matte painting veteran Jan Domela setting up for a glass shot. You can read more about Domela at the blog Matte Shot
point of interest. In Planet of the Vampires(among other movies I'm sure), Mario Bava used a mirror to reflect a model set, and removed the silver on part of the mirror to show the actors with a partial full sized set. This allowed him to create a "matte painting" that moved with things like smoke blowing etc. I believe it is called the Schufftan Process. I imagine they ran into the same challenges with this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sch%C3%BCfftan_process
Very interesting art in the video of the invisible man from Beijing. I was surprised at how the optical illusion was rendered on the photos and the shoot. Philippines Blog
I've always been impressed with photos of Matt Smith painting -- they always seem to have this effect. His values and colors are spot on and his brushwork is loosely descriptive but not overwrought.
The best matte painters seem to have this sort of randomly accurate quality to their brushwork.
Thanks for linking to my matte shot special effects blog. I'm astounded by the vast number of clicks which have originated from your Gurney Journey readers - who for the most part spend a fair chunk of time looking at the magic of golden era hand painted illusions.... with not a PC or Mac anywhere in reach...true maestros of the art of "the movie special effect that nobody ever noticed".
Let’s face it: laundromats and oil painting don’t mix. But there I was with my paint kit, a beautiful gumball machine in front of me, and three hours to kill.
I set up my easel and my folding chair next to a washing machine, which is visible in the right of the painting. I left just enough floorspace for people to squeeze past me with their laundry hampers.
It took a while to draw in all those darned colored gumballs. As I painted them, my worst fear was that someone would actually buy a gumball and mess up the arrangement.
Sure enough, a kid snuck up behind me and jammed a quarter into the slot. He spun the handle before I could say anything. Each time he cranked it, all the gumballs shuffled around inside.
“Hey, my still life!” I protested weakly.
He popped the gumball in his cheek and narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing?” he said, between chews. “You an artist?”
Thanks to Dan Dos Santos of the blog "Muddy Colors" for recommending Color and Light in the Top Ten Art Books of 2010.
By the way, I’ve been filling all your mailed-in orders, and I just want to compliment all of you wives who are giving the book as a gift to your husbands—and vice-versa. That’s really nice of you!
If you mailed in an order and are wondering when it will come, I’ve been turning them around within 24 hours after receiving them. Today I mailed out orders that were postmarked between November 30-Dec.3 and received yesterday.
18 Comments on Gumball Machine, last added: 12/9/2010
I was doing a watercolor sketch of a gum ball machine and a woman bought one. I told her she just ruined the whole picture and then I laughed. She did too. Kay
I received my signed book today! It's great to have a true Christmas present under the tree already. I can't wait to open it and delve into color and light!
Thanks for the sketch and the signature! They look great!
I just got my copy of Color and Light in the mail today- wow; I planned to spend my precious time painting tonight, but reading this ought to be as good as any practice! I bought mine before I heard your offer to autograph them, rats. It's a great, clarifying book- thanks so much for your effort!
Love the gum ball painting. I just happened upon an old gum ball machine that someone gave me when they were cleaning out a old warehouse. So I hope to paint the thing, without worrying about any kids. I don't allow kids in my studio.
In specular reflection, light rays bounce off the surface of an object at the same relative angle that they approached it. In diffuse reflection, light rays bounce off in many directions.
For example, under normal conditions a rooftop has a matte surface which reflects the light diffusely. The rooftops in the painting on the left show diffuse reflection on a dry, sunny day. The sketch on the right shows slate rooftops after a rainstorm. The thin surface of water remaining on the rooftops now reflects the light more specularly.
“Speculum” is Latin for mirror; the rooftops in the second sketch do act more like a mirror, revealing reflections of the dark chimneys.
Many surfaces are a combination of specular and diffuse reflections. When you polish a shoe or an apple, what you’re doing is increasing the relative proportion of specular versus diffuse reflection.
I've had a Dinotopia Store Order Form for Color and Light sitting on the counter for about a week now. Today's post was the final nudge I needed to put it in the mail. Well played, sir. And thank you.
Thanks for that, something I already kind of new but its clearer now :) Thats one thing Im hoping to get from the book is to just be able to put names on all these effects so im more conscience of them when im painting.
A new book about American landscape painter William Trost Richards describes the artist’s tribulations while painting the sea from life. Richards says:
“I watch and watch it, try to disentangle its push and leap and recoil, make myself ready to catch the tricks of the big breakers and am always startled out of my self possession by the thunder and the rush, jump backward up the loose shingle of the beach, sure this time that I will be washed away, get soaked with spray, and am ashamed that I had missed getting the real drawing of such a splendid one, and this happens twenty times an hour and I have never got used to it.”
The book was produced by the Cantor Arts Center of Stanford University in California, based on the sizable collection of WTR’s studies inherited by his youngest son in 1905 and donated to the museum in 1992.
The 9.5 x 11-inch book has over 204 pages, with 250 color reproductions documenting the entire collection at Stanford. It includes his Ruskin-influenced early pencil studies of plants, his Adirondack landscapes, and his seascape studies in gouache and oil. Trost Richards was the king of gouache landscape, often working on toned paper to capture transitory atmospheric and aquatic effects.
The emphasis is on his small plein-air studies, which rival those of Frederic Church, Peder Monsted and Ivan Shishkin for impeccably accurate observation. Because Richards worked in this mode well after it was fashionable (he called himself a “fogy”), he is not as well known as he deserves to be.
Yesterday I had the privilege of announcing the winners of the North Bennington Plein Air Competition.
From left to right, they are Hiu Lai Chong of Maryland, Jane Ramsey of Pennsylvania, and Andrew Orr of Vermont.
Ramsey’s first-place watercolor, “Storm Watch” depicts the roofline of the barn that formerly served as the studio of painter Kenneth Nolan. It’s now part of the Taraden Bed and Breakfast, one of the hosts and sponsors of the event. The artful cropping gives a fresh revelation of a familiar motif, with cool reds and rust colors contrasting with the blue-greens of the slate shingles.
Orr won second place with “Breaking Light,” one of four landscapes he exhibited showing the Vermont countryside near the town of North Bennington. In the painting, the clouds come and go across the far hills, with a variety of crisp and soft edges. His adept handling of chiaroscuro—light-on-dark and dark-on-light—dramatizes the scene.
Chong’s third place oil “Yard Work” captures the close color harmonies in the train depot, with strong compositional lines leading into the design. She simplified what must have been an immense amount of detail of white gravel and cross ties in the foreground.
Etc, Etc. I see what you mean, but there’s nothing special about the winning painting being done on the grounds of Taraden--it was one of the main locations for the paint-out, so a large number of of the pieces were done there.
Frank Costantino, one of the organizers of the North Bennington Plein Air Competition, explained the rules for the Quick-Draw event to approximately 40 participating artists.
Paint anywhere in the grounds of the historic Park-McCullough House, start when you hear the bell at 1:30, and stop two hours later.
I was attracted to a 1938 Dodge Pickup. Besides being a gorgeous old truck, I liked the chiaroscuro: light-on-dark on the front end, and dark-on-light on the rear end to the right. I also wanted to feature the reflection of the illuminated grass on the shadow side of the vehicle.
In preparation for the bell, I premixed batches of color with the palette knife to save time later (that was legal).
One half hour into the painting, I drew in the big shapes with a bristle brush and blocked in the grass and background.
Halfway through, I knocked in the basic shadow color of the truck and the building. I was really sweating it at this point, thinking “I’ll never finish!”
I tried to look for similar planes, muttering to myself such things as “upfacing planes in the shadow of the truck.” The goal is to hit all of those similar tones at the same time when I had that color on the brush, rather than wasting time going back with the same thought.
Only a half hour left, I softened some edges, such as along the hood and the top of the cab.
Beautifully done! Did you have any spectators asking questions? That's always a bit annoying when you're in a timed event such as this. Premixing your palette is a great idea.
Great picture, hard to believe that it was done in only two hours! I suppose that years of practice in plein air painting trains the eye to spot similar planes (I'm hopeless at it). Adrenaline seekers, no need for bungee jumping and such, just set yourselves a tight time schedule to produce a complete, detailed painting! :)
Exciting play by play and nicely done -- I'd still be struggling with the drawing/measuring into the second hour. (Though I suppose while you were premixing your colors you were noticing measurements too.)
I don't usually premix my palette when painting en plein air but it sure would be a good exercise to try and in the case of a quick draw -- a good strategy.
mr. gurney has such a bold brush handling that he finds himself repeatedly in the need to tighten up the screws on his portable easel to prevent the nasty wobble ;P
Actually you could have used white gouache by adding a little oil to it but given most people have these tiny tubes you would have had to paint a very small painting.
I suppose if one was out somewhere that was to far to find a store you could paint a tonal sketch using the ground and one color.
I remember there was a Lord Peter Wimsey mystery by Dorothy Sayers which took place in a St. John's Wood-style art colony. One of the key "clews" was that the victim's outdoor paintbox was missing the Flake White. Don't recall how that identified the murderer, though. Maybe he was a watercolorist.
A beer? No, kidding. I meant a white . . . Best reason to paint in a pack is, "Hey, can I have a squirt of paint?"
Off to spend a weekend up on Mt. Hood w/Greg M. (You know who, that painterly illustration guy.) Gonna force him to do a little plein air painting outside . . .
Please post lots of pics from this event if you can (when you have a chance). I wasn't able to make it this time around, but I'm off in other parts of Vermont doing some plein air painting none the less!
Daroo, yes, that's a Lorrain or dark mirror for helping compare relative light values. More on a previous post: http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2008/01/lorrain-mirrors.html.
Thomas, Greg Manchess is a great painter, and I can't wait to see what he does outside.
Matthew, sorry to miss meeting you here, and have fun painting. I'll post more pics over the next couple days.
Earlier this morning I upoaded some photos to Blogger as a "blog to be written" but voila! I pressed the "publish post" button, and here we are... photos and no story.
So, a few quick notes before I return to illustrating "The Great Top-Secret Kids Picture Book" (no, that is not the real title; I am, indeed, sworn to secrecy).
Anyway, first up is a photo of me with Mrs. Catharine Lotze, art teacher at Canfield High School (Canfield, Ohio, 1972).
A few months later, between my junior and senior years of high school, my parents allowed me to travel to West Virginia to take part in William Gerhold's watercolor workshop (for adults, I was by far the youngest person there). Here I am just prior to a really bad wasp sting (or horsefly, who knows) zooming up my pant leg. (1973)
A year later, my senior year of high school, I am standing reluctantly for my photo in the high school year book of Brookfield High School, in Brookfield, Ohio (1974).
And, lastly, here I am in a photo taken by Mark on our honeymoon, 2007. See, I am still painting!
Stay tuned while I look for "photo of freshman KSU art student with really big glasses!"
In November of 1980, I did this plein-air gouache painting of the Landmark Hotel in Las Vegas.
At the time, I never would have guessed that less than 15 years later, it would be demolished. The event happened at night and was featured in Tim Burton’s 1995 movie “Mars Attacks.”
Wake up, people! That's not a controlled demolition! It clearly was cut in half by a rogue transformer with a giant japanese katana! The government was behind the cover-up! :))
(insert other conspiracy theories after the fold :))
It's really neat to see a painting of Las Vegas from this time period. I recently (2008?) did a pen drawing across from the Stratosphere in almost the same area - and it looks nothing like this.
Watching that thing collapse was almost tragic, but fascinating at the same time. So strange to think that something that so many people put so much time and effort into could be destroyed in a blink of an eye like that.
Last night plein-air painter Marc Hanson began a project of painting a month of nocturnes. His goal is to paint two paintings from observation every night in September. He'll post each day following and share his experiences.
Last night he went through a lot of bug spray, and gave a lot of thought to how much light to use on his work. ---- Marc Hanson's Nocturne Experiment Thanks, Dan Root: www.danrootart.com
Bennington Banner article on next week's plein-air event in Vermont, with cash prizes, horse drawn carriage rides, lectures, and a vintage car show. Anyone can register to enter the Quick-Draw event!
7 Comments on Marc Hanson's Nocturnes, last added: 9/4/2010
DOn't know about whistler's technique w/ nocturnes but he was a student of lecoq - who emphasized training in memory drawing and painting - they were puported to have a system where they could remember shape value and color using memorized swatches in short its possible that Whistler memorized a scene and painted it later.
since the technique essentially includes 'painting' the picture in your head it would make sense.
Thank you for sharing this, following the blog already.
now, a bit off topic, I have bought your book Imaginative Realism, and I just want to mention how clearly explains everything I wanted to know, thank you !
Pyracantha competitions at the Royal academies of europe used to require you paint a history scene from memory /imagination here is a fascinating article about the tradition of drawing from memory http://www.allbusiness.com/retail-trade/miscellaneous-retail-miscellaneous-shopping/4424231-1.html
I have never tried painting a nocturnal scene with natural media, and I was always wondering, how one should go about matching/mixing colors, lighting your canvas and such. I hope to get some insight on these questions from this series!
I did do some nocturnal sketching outside with a Nintendo DS which I found, in spite of my general preference to not use too much technology in art, a very useful tool. The backlit display substitutes an external light source and adjustable brightness allowed me to mute the lightness of the screen to match the lighting conditions without having to adjust my eyes too much. Also, its portability and speed are great assets.
The North Bennington Plein Air Competition will be held September 8-12 in North Bennington, Vermont. This first-annual event brings together an invited list of on-location painters in a lovely setting.
There will be a quick draw, a wagon ride for artists to scout motifs, an auction, cash prizes, and various social events. Art buyers will be able to acquire some fine works in various media. I’ll be there as a judge, but I’ll be painting as well.
I’ll also be giving two lectures:
Thursday, September 9 at 4:00. Imaginative Realism. Behind-the-scenes view of the creation of Dinotopia and other realistic fantasies. Location: Historic Park McCullough. Geared for both artists and family audiences (bring the kids!). Book signing to follow. 802-442-5441.
Thursday evening, September 9 at 8:00 Plein-Air Pioneers. History and modern practice of outdoor painting. Location: Deane Carriage Barn on the campus of Bennington College. Book signing to follow.
Note: Quick-draw artists should register ASAP. Go to website for details and registration form.
You've actually inspired me to do more plein air drawing. It makes sense since my own work takes place in an outdoors setting. I've tried doing sketches of weirdly shaped trees in Fort Tryon Park in Manhattan and in the future, I plan to head to Central Park and Alley Pond Park.
This is fantastic news!I grew up in Vermont and then moved back here after college to live and work as a full time freelance illustrator. I'm going to do my best to get out to this event one way or another. i think I would feel extremely out of place competeing int he competition as I rarely do plein air paintings these days. I'm also just trying to scrape together some funds to actually be able to go to the event. I was in New York about a year ago for a show opening I had there and I told a friend from there that you are one of my favorite artists. She tried to get me interested in tracking you down but I would have to chose between that or the show opening so unfortunately I went to the opening ,LOL.
As we’ve seen in a couple of recent posts, the thought process always comes before the painting. Everything depends on your initial thought or feeling. You may decide to go for photographic accuracy, or you may want to caricature the form, as we saw yesterday.
One guiding thought is to rearrange the elements to convey an idea. I showed you this painting of an Irish graveyard a while ago, but now I want you to see what the actual view looks like.
I returned to the same churchyard on our recent trip to Ireland.
For the painting I was inspired to express something deeper emotionally (which I can’t put into words) and I had to move the gravestones around like chess pieces until they stirred up those feelings. ------------ The painting will be in the upcoming book “Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter,” (November, 2010), which is now at the printer.
The graves belong to the Corry family of Kilnaboy, County Clare: Michael (d. 1965) and Delia (d. 1970), Regina (d. 1980) and Tom (d. 2005); Patrick (d 1915) and Ann (d. 1961) Corry and their niece Nanette O’Regan (d. 1950).
7 Comments on Gravestones as Chess Pieces, last added: 8/21/2010
Cameras record the flat "reality" of a scene. Artists sometimes process that scene through the heart and give us images that "express something deeper emotionally."
This post is a powerful counterpoint to the earlier post on Scart Rd. If all we ask our human hands and eyes to do is faithfully replicate a camera's exposure, we miss the opportunity to bring our deeper reality -- some would say our souls -- into expression. Of course, the more skill and technique we bring to that work, the better, but it's the feelings that "can't be put into words" that make art a vital expression of the human experience.
When I realized that there could be a marriage of what I wanted the image to be and what the image was in reality, things really changed for me. I'm glad you mentioned that you wanted to convey a particular emotion, and took liberties to make that happen all the while informed by the scene before you.
Hopefully that sketchbook of your travel paints will be at the printer soon as well!
Dairy cows don’t pose. You might think they hold still when you see them placidly grazing in a field, but the minute you set up to sketch them, they start moving around like chipmunks.
If you want to paint them from life, the key is to organize the palette. For these Holsteins, I pre-mixed a dark gray and a black for their dark spots, and a couple of light tones for their white areas. I kept a separate brush for each tone.
I quickly drew their shapes with a brush on the 8 x 10 inch panel, which was oil primed with a tint of burnt sienna. Then I dove in with the tones.
15 Comments on Hold Still, Holsteins, last added: 4/23/2010
Beautiful painting! I know what you mean with them moving around the minute you start, oftentimes I can only get a head or leg drawn before the animal thunders away.
Thanks, everybody. Jonas, I think there's about 15 minutes in each of them. Sometimes I start one and come back to it if another cow moves into that position.
Very nice cows! I agree with Art and Illustration, it looks so easy! It's a shame I live in Finland, I'd love to be able to go to your demonstrations and lectures and ask you loads of questions..
I'd call this a plein air piece except that I did it out of my studio window yesterday afternoon. We got 22 inches of snow over the weekend! I hadn't painted snow in a long time...fun! Wish I had a bigger view from my studio window but you make what you can out of what you get, right? ;-)
2 Comments on Neighbor's House, last added: 2/9/2010
HAHA! I LOVE that video, Jim=) You did a great parody of the way athletes like to be all out of breath in interviews and talking about their plans but never saying what their plans are.
The big questions is... Were you actually painting, or just pretending? Because if you were, that is total awesomeness.
Ah Jim, what next? Amazing. If only Mr. Kooks had been on your shoulder. It's a good thing you've mastered the art of falling in slow motion. Doing it in real time can be painful.
One of my former students, Meg Sinclair, is a dedicated unicyclist and her whole family goes to unicycle gatherings. Games such as playing a version of hockey with a flaming tennis ball are standard. I'll make sure Meg sees this video. When do we see the finished painting?
oh my lord! this is fantastic, did you edit this too, ah, your jedi video skills are complete.
i agree with steve if you would have had mr kooks on your shoulder it would have been perfect, you could have had the real one during the talking parts, and then when you were riding you could have had a fake one, it would have been hilarious, but this is great too!
five stars for the puddle crash!!! hilarious!
and now since you shared your hilarious video i would like to share what i beleive to be the funnist video on the internet..
Now, I'm from Europe and the reason this sport has not entered our side of the ocean is well...I'm gonna say it as it is but the Unicycle painting sport has been plagued by way to many doping scandals.
But allegations that J. Gurney uses substances to make his paint dry faster are false! These substances are detectable and he has never been caught! So don't you dare accusing him of something he didn't do!!
In fact it's far worse. He uses a mahlstick during a plain air competition and throws it in the woods right before doping control. Untraceable! I mean, how low can you go !?
But I love the Strong Arm imitation. I think you're even doing his accent, right?
Well, for all Strong Arm fans out there, here's a treat from our Flemish Sports Channel Sporza The second clip on the left, titled "Lance Armstrong heeft geen tijd..." ("Lance has no time...") is a juicily embarrassing moment. Watch the poor interviewer's face as he hears that Lance has no time for a promised(!) interview. Luckily Lance does sign the table that will be sold for a charity purpose.
(Obliged to say that on the other hand, the other clips show Lance making multiple efforts to solve a conflict between Sporza and his Astana team)
I love the foliage sound of the frogs there, nice touch James! Your narrative and demo is great too. How on earth do do you have the time to do that other dinosaury stuff you do?
I love the simplicity of your approach, are you premixing? or you do your mixing as you paint. I particularly like the way you did the rocks that are inside the water.thanks for this tips,they are very helpful
Great video! I've only been plein aire painting a handful of times and I was just curious if you use any medium? Also while you're out how do you go about cleaning your brushes?
Thanks, folks! Quick answers: I goof off on videos and such between 4 and 6 am when I can't sleep. These videos just take a few minutes to make in iMovie.
I use Gamblin oil prime (tinted with burnt sienna), Liquin and Gamblin Turps for mediums, and I do premix about four values of each of the principal colors.
Sorry to hear I'm not the only one afflicted with early morning wakefulness, Jim. You make much more productive use of the time...
We just returned from a trip to Lake Superior. I spent part of one afternoon trying to paint -- in watercolor -- a spot where a creek flows into the lake. If you ever do a watercolor plein air of flowing water I'd love to see it. It's frustrating trying to save white paper for the sparkles and reflected light. Winslow Homer wasn't above scraping with a knife to bring the white back, but being able to place with it brush, particularly when the bright spots are in a rippled pattern, would be much more satisfying. I've never cared for what white gouache does in those situations -- even when Homer used it.
James, I'm a brazilian cartoonist and your fan a long tome... your work is so fantastic that I surelly would put you between Da Vinci and Michelangelo! Wow!!!!!!!!!!!! Best wishes from Brazil
Jared, It was four hours solid, except a 15 minute break when Jeanette brought me a tomato and cheese sandwich (thanks, Jeanette!).
The light didn't change much because it was cloudy most of the time. The direct sun only came out briefly. I don't work on location studies back in the studio mainly because I've moved on from the energy of the moment, and the photos are too disappointing. If I needed more time, I'd return to the location the next day at the same time.
Yesterday the group of landscape painters known as the Hudson River Fellowship officially finished their month long residency in the Catskill Mountains of New York State.
On Friday, the weary but triumphant band of artists gathered in Hunter, New York for the traditional potluck supper and the showing of the harvest of pencil drawings and oil studies. Above: Emilee Lee.
Among the chief inspirations for their approach are the pre-Impressionist location studies by Asher Durand, Frederic Church, William Trost Richards, and the Russian sylvan wizard Ivan Shishkin. Below: a work by HRF fellow Erik Koeppel.
The HRF students come from all over the world. They receive a free scholarship, though the association is not an atelier or academy as such. To preserve the feeling of collegiality, the name was changed from “Hudson River School for Landscape” to “Hudson River Fellowship.” The instructor is Nature herself. Below: Noah Layne
This summer Mother Nature dealt them an unusual amount of rain, wind, bears, and mosquitoes, along with the the usual challenges of changing light and fluctuating stream levels.
“It is through extensive and real engagement that the artist learns to capture the spirit of the landscape,” the website says. “The many hundreds of hours spent out in the sun and the wind, scrupulously studying nature, transform the artist.”
Charles Williams told me that they woke up before the sun rose each morning and often stayed on site until sunset to capture the fleeting colors of dusk.
Many of the students hail from an academic background, where their precise observation skills help them sort out and organize the vast complexity that confronts the eye in a forest streamscape or a tree study. As Sadie Valeri puts it, they learn to “Slooooow waaaaay doooooown,” and really observe before they put down each stroke.
The disciplined observation of the HVF, if it is combined with feeling and imagination, is sure to “boldly originate a high and independent style,” as Asher Durand wrote in 1855. --------- Grand Central Academy blog showing behind the scenes. Official HVF website. Sadie Valeri’s blog, with videos of painting in a downpour. Previous GJ post on the Hudson River School for Landscape.
13 Comments on Hudson River Fellowship, last added: 8/7/2009
Thanks for this. It's inspiring to know about opportunities to grow as artists and naturalists like this. I especially enjoyed the link to the blog. You can see the incredible work they did on the July 13 and 17 posts. And the photos on the other posts make it look like they had a really great time.
Would you describe how the large umbrella was secured in Emily's set up? Thanks for your help.
My umbrella is too short for me to stand under if it's poked into the ground, and tips the pochade and tripod over if it's attached to them. I may need to find an extension pole for it to go into the ground.
Lariaine, I think people put weights on the bottom of tripods to stabllize them - photographers use sand bags (you don't have to carry the weight around, you can fill them up on site)
James, thanks for posting these. I have taken some classes at Grand Central and attended some lectures- Jabcob (and the other founding members, Dan Thompson, etc) did an amazing job bringing back high academic standards to art training.
Much as I complain about living in NYC, it truly is an artist and art students paradise right now.
Judsons also sells an umbrella kit with a separate stand with a spike so you can keep it off your easel.
Personally I think this is a better idea if your going to use an umbrella as those pochade boxes tend to be a little top heavy and adding more variables too help with the laws of physics is a good thing to avoid.
The strongest out door easel is made by Take It easel but they are no longer producing them. It's a improved version of the Gloucester easel. What they are selling are the Chinese ones and they are fixing them up to work properly, which they were not.
Laraine, I agree with I,me and Jeff. Unless the umbrella is very small, I wouldn't attach it to the pochade.
If you put the words "white umbrellas" in the search box of this blog, you'll come up with two or three posts on the subject, including the Disaster at Kaaterskill Creek.
James, Jeff, I-me -- Thanks for the Judson umbrella reference-- it's a good solution for soft ground. I'll need a different combination for pavement. The rock I used last week needed to be considerably larger to keep the pochade tripod stable. Thanks to everyone for your help.
James it was great meeting you, and thanks for the link to my blog!
After reading the comments here I was inspired to write up my reviews of the outdoor painting products we used: umbrellas, pochade boxes, panels, and camp chairs. Take a look if you are interested!
Some great painters, such as John Sargent and Anders Zorn, did their most memorable work when they were face-to-face with their motif. Nature is so rich in her inspiration, it's reasonable to ask: how can anyone improve on a plein-air painting?
Isaac Levitan (1860-1900) painted this perfectly competent study on location. It shows a log bridge at the end of a millpond. It is well observed and executed. But it leaves no impression on the imagination.
Back in the studio he refined the image and transformed it into poetry.
He simplified the background row of trees and added a ragged patch of evening clouds. He eliminated the floating log and developed the row of timbers in the lower left. He brought more attention to the uncertain footpath leading from the foreground plank across the three logs to the thin distant trail.
The image suddenly takes on a new interest, not because it is more finished, but because it is better composed. By sifting his direct impressions through the filter of memory and imagination, his work touches the emotions. We stand at the crossing point between our frail human pathway and the downward journey of the falling water, as the sunset prepares to cast us into darkness.
By the Millpond (1892) is one of Levitan’s most beloved works, and it is one of the touchstones of the Russian landscape tradition.
11 Comments on Plein Air and Poetry, last added: 8/1/2009
Thought-provoking post. The entire quality of light changes from the plein air to the studio piece. From a predominantly yellow image with limited contrast in values, Levitan cooled off the colors and brought the path into higher contrast. It's possible if Levitan returned to the same site on successive evenings, he could have found that light and created the second painting completely outdoors. But maybe not.
My wife and I know people who insist on painting strictly on location, and never revisit or complete in a studio a piece they began outdoors. It's an honorable point of view, but if Levitan had felt that way we wouldn't have this painting. If painting communicates truth, perhaps we need to trust that truth is portable and we can carry it within us.
I agree...thought provoking post. Edgar Payne from what I read never displayed his Plein Air. He used them as studies and went back into the studio to refine his composition.
Once again you've read my mind. It was only a few days ago that I was pondering the exact same thing, how to transform my pleine air studies on my blog to something more worthwhile during the hard winter months here in Sweden. Some of them I have now come to regard as visual shorthand (anything that is really fleeting, like a sunset or insane cloud formations. Most of these are executed in under 30 min.) I must say that these are alot of fun to do as well. Arkhip Kuindzhi, Fedor Vasilev and especially Alexsei Savrasov are fellow Wanderers who has GREAT early morning and late evening pieces, and I would love to be able to see what their pleine airs looked like!
Steve, on the other side of the coin is Sorolla, he painted from life outdoors even his VERY large pieces, and I don't think wed have those fresh crazy paintings if he was in a studio. Some painters feed of the outdoors, others the privacy of the studio, and some both. Whatever floats our boats!
The poet Wordsworth once said that poetry is "emotion recollected in tranquility." We can apply this to painting, as well. The plein air piece is emotion, directly stated and with what tools, physical as well as mental, that the artist took into the field. Often, tranquility (nor time) is available in sufficient quantity to bring poetry to the scene. For that, we have the studio.
Lovely! They are both striking in their own ways. Ones an impressive sketch and the other one you could walk into. Levitan never ceases to impress me. Thanks for the inspiration!
I don't find the studio version better, just different. For example, I find the distant trees in the plein air much more effective than those in the studio piece. I think the lighting is at least as evocative in the plein air also.
But I've always been drawn to the spontaneity of plein air. I just love to see the balance between accurate observation and the evidence of the artist's hand. Chalk it up to taste, I guess.
It's a really interesting post. A lot of paintings you see in galleries today, especially in the Southwest, are more in keeping with the first version, the plein air. But I have also seen painters like Scott Christensen and Richard Schmid bring their plein air paintings back to the studio to finish them, which I assume means add a lot of detail that comes from the imagination (imagination as far as color and composition).
I have painted plein air for some time now. Lately I have been finding the results disconnected from me somehow...I hope that makes sense. I have been experimenting a lot lately with adding details to these pieces as well as creating paintings entirely from my imagination.
A friend of mine the other day said there are two kinds of artists: those who observe and those whose art comes from the mind. I suppose an art career is about not only improving technical skill, but also figuring out which camp you fall into.
The quality of light is so much better in the first and I instinctively know what time of day it is.
The second captures an atmosphere and feeling that the artist is trying to convey. He's no longer recording his experience, but embellishing it to us as one would a story.
How do you do it? How do you find these images of studies and finished pieces and all? I am truly amazed at your blog.
Beyond that...this holds to what I believe. While a plein air painting can be wonderful in its own right, the studio is where an artist can truly find themselves. Working from life is crucial to get an understanding of what is seen, but (to me) it seems rarely that a plein air piece evokes what was felt. From my experience, that is almost always done back in the studio where you can sit and plan and figure out the best ways to manipulate the principles of painting to best convey the idea you want to get across.
I look at almost all of my favorite artists, and while I believe all painted outdoors, their masterpieces were commonly done inside.
This is a great find and dissimilation on the Plein air to refined technique.
For a long time, I found the finish for Plein Aire frustrating, and perhaps resigned to the dude under a canopy or a giant tent, to survive the british outdoors.
The finished painting, and its simplification of its initial live study makes perfect sense, and perhaps a change of mindset to assume plein aire as rapid onset studies: sketchings with colour notations might be key towards a more refined paitning for me
One day Edgar Payne was painting outdoors, far from any sign of habitation. He was surprised to find a man behind him, watching.
Then the man said, “ Why that’s nuthin but puttin’ on daubs!”
A little later the man shook his head and said, “But you sure gotta know where to put them daubs!” and walked away. ------ Recollection by Evelyn Payne Hatcher in an addendum to Composition of Outdoor Painting by Edgar A. Payne.
19 Comments on Puttin’ on Daubs, last added: 6/27/2009
A story has it that Paul Cezanne was feverishly applying his customary daubs of pure color to his canvas one day while painting en plein air. A passerby approached, ceremoniously informing Cezanne that he had been a pupil of the great Corot. "But, painting is all about tones, tones, tones", he pronounced. With this, the irritated and irascible Cezanne is said to have taken his knife, scraped down the entire canvas, emitted an audible emission of gas, and said, "There! That's better!"
I, myself, when out working in public places, prefer when casual observers watch in silence. At times, you may be trying to solve a difficult patch of the picture, and even an innocent "Ah hum" can distract, even wound. But, then maybe I'm too sensitive?
At least Payne's observer managed to extricate himself from an initially hasty comment by finishing with a very insightful commentary on the painting process itself. "It's all about daubs, daubs, daubs!"
A painter friend was giving a photographer mutual friend a hard time, awhile back, saying photographers just click the shutter.
Having just returned from San Francisco, where I was able to see the Robert Frank show with EVERY print from his classic book The Americans, there's sure something to be said for knowing WHEN to click the shutter, and nobody knew when was a better time than Robert Frank! A wonderful show!
I didn't know Edgar Paines, now I do great painter. Thanks james for the introduction, I love the story too. when I just to paint outdoors I always had funny comments from the people passing by , it didn't bother me , painting is such a lonely craft that some time to have a comment or two makes the day go faster.
I really like the muted colors in Payne's background, contrasting with the brighter foreground. It reminds me of the guidelines for creating the illusion of distance given in the James Perry Wilson posts from January.
On the subject of daubs, my wife and I recently had the privilege of contemplating the Monet paintings at the Art Institute of Chicago. After years of seeing reproductions of his pond series and haystack series, it was a revelation to get arm's length from the actual canvas. Up close, just a lot of daubs. A few steps back, the daubs lock together into something miraculous. Maybe rather than "lock together," it's just the opposite: tumblers clicking into place and a door swinging open.
Funny and true and a very effective post! I learn with writing and illustrating every day, that there are only two rules: 1 - put words (or daubs) down. 2 - know where to put them.
Tanaudel, you remind me of the quote by J. S. Bach to a student who marveled at his virtuosity:
"It’s easy to play any musical instrument," he said. "All you have to do is touch the right key at the right time and the instrument will play itself."
Great story! I am going up that way next month to paint those Buttes that Payne immortalized. I just LOVE his oil paintings and his book on composition is a must read....
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“Wilson developed a rigorous method for painting skies in his large scale dioramas that had its roots in his plein air paintings. While painting outdoors, he would carefully blend progressive tints of his three main colors, the horizon, mid-sky, and upper sky, into a graduated, light-filled sky color.
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Wow that's really interesting! Thanks for sharing xx
Wow. Google is going to own our water supplies one day. This is really intriguing!
Does the last chart show not only the effect of the seasons on many outdoor painters, but does it also show the effect of a bad economy on them, too? The lower spikes after 2006 seem to coincide roughly with when the economy began to go downhill.
Can we learn anything from how the Steampunk graph shows growth during the same bad economy, when concept art, plein air, and performance art all show decline?
Do vampires and Lady Gaga have something in common???
By the way, I love painting outdoors in winter.
Ha! That's fantastic! Thanks for sharing!
The uptick in the steampunk graph was one thing I noticed. I have been predicting for about 5 months that as far as a genre (Ex.Harry Potter, Twilight and Vampires), Steampunk is going to be big by the end of the summer.
I have been working bit by bit on a Steampunk style story for sometime, but being an artist not really a writer, it's slow goings. I hope the wave of Steampunk interest will still be rolling in and when I get it finished, that aside mark my words it's coming.