I'd add one from Helen Van Wyk: "Stop painting when you feel one step from finished." She was the only person who did painting shows that could actually -paint-. Taught a lot about color theory and paint mixing as well. It's a shame she was never as popular as Bob Ross as she was the real thing and she was free.
I can't see anything here I'd argue with except for the shrink comment; that's personal to him and not so much a truth.
I was talking to a friend last night about action and depicting it, and I said I found that the bolder you felt while drawing, the more action was conveyed as you can't depict movement with tentative linework. Sometimes just wanting to SLASH the paper helps, though there needs to be control as well.
Thanks for passing this stuff on, dood. We're always learning and in need to learn more. Always. *HUG*
That's a good'n. Richard said similar stuff. That was part of his crit of my work, too.
The therapy statement was partly tongue-in-cheek, as you've probably guessed. He was discussing the psychological aspects of art at the time. I think there is much truth in saying that making art has a theraputic effect (this has been the case for me, over the past couple months, as you know). If it's so that creating art is a personal act, then it follows that what we choose to depict and the way in which we show it is a reflection of our own psyche, a sort of State of the Psyche declaration.
I'll tell you this. His crit nailed me on every level you can think of. Richard saw right square into me. It was amazing and a little freaky too.
Advice from a buddy of mine: if possible, sleep on a painting before calling it finished. Take a gander at it the following morning and see if there's anything you missed.
He had dozens of little gems like this. You had to let some of 'em go, though, otherwise you'd spend more time taking notes than watching him paint, and the latter was even more instructive than the former.
*reads* Okay, riddle me this, Batman: if nothing is what it is except by comparison, why would you paint the focal point first, when there's nothing else on the canvas to compare it to? Yeah, got you on that one...
I agree with your footnote on 'question everything'. I often have to remind myself to do what works rather than what would be physically accurate. Plenty of conditions in the real world are only believable because they are real; if you depicted them on canvas literally, nobody would ever believe them.
I got a lot out of this course. One thing I walked away with was an awareness of how much I've slacked off in areas like value. My value ranges have become as soft and mushy as my gut. Time to start whippin' both back into shape.
Leading into the whole issue of questioning: double-checking your work at every major stage is a must. Is the composition solid? The value structure? The color key? Rendering? Have you kept track of what it is you're trying to say? Does it hold together in the end?
Richard used Ansel Adams as a reference point. Adams developed a technique for landscape photography that made the focal plane infinite, for all intents and purposes...everything was in focus, from the mountains in the background to the flowers in the foreground. The human eye doesn't perceive that way; can't see that way. It's physically impossible. Yet we've been raised on photography, and the lessons every artist used to be raised with before the advent of film aren't necessarily part of the rigamarole anymore
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I can't see anything here I'd argue with except for the shrink comment; that's personal to him and not so much a truth.
I was talking to a friend last night about action and depicting it, and I said I found that the bolder you felt while drawing, the more action was conveyed as you can't depict movement with tentative linework. Sometimes just wanting to SLASH the paper helps, though there needs to be control as well.
Thanks for passing this stuff on, dood. We're always learning and in need to learn more. Always. *HUG*
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The therapy statement was partly tongue-in-cheek, as you've probably guessed. He was discussing the psychological aspects of art at the time. I think there is much truth in saying that making art has a theraputic effect (this has been the case for me, over the past couple months, as you know). If it's so that creating art is a personal act, then it follows that what we choose to depict and the way in which we show it is a reflection of our own psyche, a sort of State of the Psyche declaration.
I'll tell you this. His crit nailed me on every level you can think of. Richard saw right square into me. It was amazing and a little freaky too.
Advice from a buddy of mine: if possible, sleep on a painting before calling it finished. Take a gander at it the following morning and see if there's anything you missed.
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I try to do this with drawings before I ink them.
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I agree with your footnote on 'question everything'. I often have to remind myself to do what works rather than what would be physically accurate. Plenty of conditions in the real world are only believable because they are real; if you depicted them on canvas literally, nobody would ever believe them.
Reply
Leading into the whole issue of questioning: double-checking your work at every major stage is a must. Is the composition solid? The value structure? The color key? Rendering? Have you kept track of what it is you're trying to say? Does it hold together in the end?
Richard used Ansel Adams as a reference point. Adams developed a technique for landscape photography that made the focal plane infinite, for all intents and purposes...everything was in focus, from the mountains in the background to the flowers in the foreground. The human eye doesn't perceive that way; can't see that way. It's physically impossible. Yet we've been raised on photography, and the lessons every artist used to be raised with before the advent of film aren't necessarily part of the rigamarole anymore ( ... )
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