Today's painting

This is today's practice painting. I'm doing a larger painting that features this peeled orange and I thought it'd be fun to do a small study. It's 5x7 oil.

The rest of the painting has one of my favorite bowls. A small silver bowl with a blue laquered interior. I like the green background. I may use it for the large painting as well.

I spent some of this afternoon browsing through a book about the Dutch masters. I'm quite partial to the portraits and especially the still lifes. I dont know that I'd ever try one of those complicated fru-fru flower ones, but I love the variety of surfaces in the paintings. Big pewter tankard, silver dish, always a peeled orange for some reason. sometimes bugs or a dead fish. Not sure the point of the bugs or fish. But...I love the look and I love the challenge of the different textures.

So...just thought I'd post todays work while the big one is in progress.

Christmas in August

First...here's a tiny fellow on the easel right now.

I walked out to the mailbox today and when I opened it up, there was a bright light and angelic singing... Turns out, it was the Blick 2010 Art Supply Catalog. Woohoo.
It was reminiscent of those days when that huge Sears catalog would arrive and I'd sit somewhere comfy and look at every page of the toy section and dog ear pages and make a note for my Christmas list. Yesterday was kind of like that. I made a cup of tea and curled up in the big chair and dived in.
Some people might flip right to the oil paint page, or the canvas, or to printing supply. Not me. I look at every page. I read every description of the product. There are paint companies that I didnt know existed. There are ones I thought were long out of business. There are ones that probably SHOULD be out of business. I scan paints I never heard of to see how much their Cobalt Blue was (always the pricey one).
I think we as artists can easily get stuck in a groove. I use THIS paint, and THIS brush and THIS canvas or whatever and we forget to look around at all that is possible. Forget that there are new advances and old techniques. New equipment and old favorites.
Through the years, I switched mediums every few years or so. I did charcoal, then pen and ink, then ink like watercolor, then pastels, colored pencils, illustration, still life, animals, portraits, abstracts....The bad part of that was that sometimes I feel that I dont have a particular 'style'. That if I showed 20 works in a variety of the range that I can do...people wouldnt necessarily be able to say, "ah, that's a Karen May...I like her work). For example, I recently showed 4 works at a financial centers open house shindig. I went to the open house and listened to people tell me what artwork they liked and yadayada. More than one person said "I really like these" (pointing to my 2 photorealistic oils), but I also like those (across the room were two oil landscapes that I'd done). I was flattered that they picked out my work as their favorites, but they had no idea that they were the same artist.
Anyhoo...I digress. I think that we should remember to look around and try new things. It doesnt have to be goofy and dangerous or expensive...just pick up some oil pastels for a change and sketch. Grab a travel watercolor set and do a few florals. God forbid...pick up a pencil and practice drawing again.
The catalog keeps me in touch with that. Just look at what's out there. Every new page and section I was like "ooooh....ahhhhh". What's next? what havent I tried? Silverpoint? Encaustic?
I am like the buffet at the Belagio. Give me some of EVERYTHING!!!!

To teach or to 'take'. Art classes

There are lots of adages about teaching. My Dad used to say "thos who can-Do, those who can't-Teach". Granted, he was an engineer and people who never left the hallowed halls of academia, but continued to teach from the latest text sources, may not have inspired great respect. In some fields, school gives you the tools and you are supposed to then run with it, keeping ahead of the curve, on top of the wave and all kinds of other silly sayings. There are other fields however that are ever changing and new discoveries and advances in science create the need for people willing to not only never leave academia, but to impart knowledge and pass the torch to a new group who will in turn, do the research, come back to teach...etc. For example, my sister is a doctor of archaeology. In her field, while the subject matter may be dry as dust (hee hee) get it? nevermind. While the subjects of study are usually long gone, new advances in technology, new tools and better understanding constantly challenges the accepted conceptions of the past. It's the complete opposite of math. There's no going back in math. In archaeology, going forward enables them to go further back.
Now uncross your eyes because this IS relevant to art. Art swings both ways so to speak. Art is about the past, somewhat about the present and about the future. We study the masters while employing new graphic tools and technology to improve what we do today and create something that will last well into the future.
If math is like a hallway where every advance firmly closes the door behind it and archaeology advances allows more and more doors to be unlocked further back, art is the funhouse where all of the doors are open, some hallways go nowhere, some doors are brick walls pretending to be doors and every door is different and you can call yourself an artist and open as many or as few as you want in any direction.
So...teachers of art. Those who can, should teach. Those who can't unfortunately, sometimes teach also...but...that's another story.
If you are a student of history and love the great masters, you can impart to a new crop of picker-uppers-of the paintbrush what they can learn from those who came before. Or, you can show them the past so that they see what NOT to do. If you develop a new technique, why hide it under a bushel basket...shine your light baby.
As a teacher, while I may be teaching a specific technique or idea, there are very few rules and many of them are like my mother-in-laws angel figurines...made to be broken. I learn as much from teaching as I think my students do. They're discoveries or 'mistakes' teach me more about what I know, what I want to try and where to go.
Now, we all know 'artists' (usually pronounced "ARTEESTS") who wear black turtlenecks, berets, and pretend they are french who think they have nothing to learn and if you dont know what they know, if you dont collect the obscure artist they looooove, then poo poo you. Forget them. they are like artistic dung beetles who gather thier toys, names, references and 'travels' around them and feel superior in describing everything as 'exquisite...simply exquisite". Pbttthhhhhh. If you come across a 'teacher' lke that...run away...run far away.
But dont forget to take classes too. I teach and I take. I learn from both. sure, I took figure drawing in college, but that was a long time ago. Get back in and charcoal yourself some nekkid folk. Yeah, you slogged your way through color theory, but who couldnt use a refresher or just a new way to look at your old pallete. Try a class in something you dont think you like. I personally want to throw myself on the floor like a 4 year old in WalMart when someone shows me what passes for abstract art. I just dont like it. Yet, when my teacher assigns something abstract, I do it. I try it. She hates it. I learn.
If you can't...well...then take up raquetball, but if you can.... take classes and teach some. There's always someone who could learn from what you know and there's always someone 'better' than you.
Have fun opening doors.

Todays mini painting

While some of it's big brothers are in drying stages, I've been tackling small paintings. I wont be so bold as to call it a 'painting a day' which I'm sure I wont paint, and also, like a sketch journal, I'm not sure that painting a painting a day solely for the sake of painting one a day is helpful in it's own right. If you want to paint every day a create a painting for the same reason that a runner stretches before a marathon, then I think it is a helpful exercise. If, though, one creates for the sake of a quota or in lieu of other painting, I'm not sure of the purpose.

But, created because I wanted the practice and while I was waiting...here is my small painting for today. This little guy is 5x5 oil on canvas

Enjoy.

EDM Every Day Matters. Why yes it does-my thoughts on sketch journals

I've decided to join up with the group Everyday Matters which is a drawing 'challenge' group. BAsically, they post a suggestion of a topc for drawing once a week and then you have a week to come up with something.
There are good and bad things with sketch journals. I think that somewhere, a few years ago, someone was keeping a sketch journal where they'd draw their daily coffee or spoon or whatever, label it with cute letters and write some Twitter-esque bit of prose to go along with it. Usually this was done in pen and may or may not have been colored in.
Since then, for some reason, this has become the style-regule for sketchbook artists and in a way, I think instead of promoting creativity, it stifles it a bit because newbies think that this is the way sketch journals are 'supposed' to look, so...they do the same. The same somewhat wiggly lines, the same slightly out of proportion drawings, the same washes of color and the same thoughtful insight on the latte of the day. PBTTTHHHHHH.
It's kind of like Bob Ross. Think what you will of his art, you have to give the guy credit for bringing art to probably millions of folks who would have otherwise never picked up a brush or had the cahones to attempt an oil painting. What happens though is that the technique is so formulaic and foolproof that people get comfortable with that 'style' and techinique and can never escape the land of the almighty tree and the majestic mountain and old rugged barn. I long for a still life. Forget the sunlit wave and paint an apple for god's sake.
I think that sometimes sketchbooks can become the same crutch. I have millions of sketchbooks. Some of them alternate between barely sketched ideas and dozens of thumbnails to work out a painting idea I have, to finished drawings and pretty groovy works on thier own. mixed in is the occasional grocery list and unlabled phone number. But, I'm not bound to my book (haha. get it...bound...to a book...nevermind). The sketchbook should be a tool, a means to an end, a catalyst or springboard. It can be a work of art in itself, but not a genre. I think that while a sketchbook may be a tempting, comfortable and maybe even easy 'gateway' art for people who like the site says "havent picked up a pencil since elementary school', but regardless of your expertise or even goals, it would be a shame for what seems to be a catalyst for creativity actually creating a fenced in world of it's own.
That being said, I think that for now, I'll follow the EDM and post some of my sketches here. But...I will also post some of my paintings, musings, sketches and ideas that are not dictated by anyone by my own little monkey muse in my head.

Finally...some color

Voila. Or, as I like to say 'Viloa". why do you always have to bring HER up?

So...Our first color layer.

After the last step, we were left with what looked like a moonlit picture of a sunflower. If the background had not already been red (yes, yes, I know...deal with it) the effect would have been lovely on its own, but now we get to the fun part and that's...adding color.

Because we did the hard part several steps ago and established the values of our subject and then honed those value judgments in the dead layer, all we really have to do now is color it in like a coloring book.

Here's another example where I dont want you (and you know who you are) to try to reinvent anything at this point.

Look at the subject. Look at each petal. while there are varying VALUES of yellow...are there really different COLORS of yellow. In this case, because our flower was dying, there were subtle color changes, but in the case of the leaves for example...they were just...green. Light and darker green, true, but all the same COLOR of green. So...while avoiding Veridian like the H1N1 virus, mix a nice green. (Sap Green is always a good bet...nice and transparent to boot). Now...pick a leaf (or whatever subject you're working on) and simply 'color it in'. Yep, just paint right over the whole leaf with the ONE shade of green that you've mixed.

Low and Behold...Lord a'mighty...look at all of the values of green that show up. That's because we're applying a thin glaze over our established value layer thereby creating a tonal shading of the green leaf. Now, if the leaf had some yellow areas, or in this case, some brownish dead spots, those will have to be addressed later.

What we dont want to do and what you shouldnt have to do if you've followed directions up to this point is mix 'lighter or darker...color".

In this example...all leaves were painted with Sap Green right out of the tube. (very little liquin even). The petals had a little bit of variety in the yellow, varying from cadmium yellow to the Oh so delicious 'Indian Yellow" which is simply Sunshine in a Tube. What I didnt have to do is vary the shades or tints of these yellows. Straight on the canvas because, again...the value work is already done.

If you wanted really light spots, the underlying dead layer should have been white. Get it? There is rarely a need to add any white to a color at this point. later, we'll add some white for details,but not at this point.

In fact, adding white to any of our colors at this point will ruin the effect. That's not overdramatic, it's simply a fact. Adding white to any paint makes it opaque (non transparent) which means we c'aint see through it...and if we can't see through it, then all previous layers are/were a complete waste of time.

One thing that I hear again and again from my students at this stage and in about 3 more steps is "Y'know...you were right. I wish I'd listened to you...NEXT TIME..." So...save yourself the time and frustration and do it right the first time.

Enjoy the first color.

Next...MORE COLOR. Woohoo!

Step 4. The Dead Layer

Howdy.

In step four of our sunflower demo, we'll do what is known as the Dead layer, or Grisaille layer. Basically, this layer creates a layer of exact values similar to the previous umber layer, but with more emphasis on the important parts of our painting.

You can do the entire picture in the dead layer, but I think emphasizing certain elements gives the finished work more punch and pizazz.

I've applied another glaze layer to the background deepening the red/violets and plum colors. Still using Purple Madder, Transparent violet and French Ultramarine.

To create the moonlit effect of the dead layer we need a neutral grey. Now... may have gotten a sense about how I feel about black -out of the tube. So...'nuff said 'bout that. Mix a neutral black. I like to use Raw Umber and Ultramarine. Maybe the slightest bit more umber than blue. When you mix them, spread a bit out on your palette and you'll see when you've reached a deep luscious black. That's what we want. Try mixing a tiny bit with white. You should wind up with a very neutral gray. If you're not sure, get a value scale from any art store, or even compare the gray to something that you know is neutral.

So, when you've made this lovely black and ensured that your grey is neutral and NOT blue (which many people err on the side of) you're ready to go.

Note: your lighting has a lot to do with it. You may find that if you work in different lights that your greys will look different. Try to work in natural light or with a full spectrum light bulb.

Now that you've got your black and subsequent grey, you can paint your dead layer. You do this by strictly following the values you established in the umber layer. Remember in step one when I said every step is built on the one before. You're brown values followed your drawing and now your dead layer will follow your umber layer. Do NOT reinvent the wheel here. If you think you've made an error in the drawing, live with it. No one is going to have the original item or photo when they view your painting to say "hey dude, this petal isnt as full as it should be'. Trust your underlying layer.

Using your created black and varying amounts of white (I use Titanium white. ) follow the values laid down previously and basically, very carefully and purposefully, paint your subject as though the finished work will be monochromatic. Keeping in mind the surface of the thing you are painting. In this case, following the flower petals the way they naturally grow.

If you tend to paint more impressionistically day to day, be extra careful to hide brush strokes. We arent going for painterly here. We're going for glowing glorious realism. Not to say anything is wrong with painterly and free impressionism, but that's not the point of THIS painting. so...hide those brushstrokes. It might even do you well to have a nice soft clean brush on hand to smooth out any rough bits. (be sure to clean or wipe off this brush regularly).

When you are finished, as you can see in this closeup, you'll have a monochromatic very detailed painting with the grey emphasis on your main subject, in this case, the sunflower.

Next step is where the fun comes in. The color glazing.