The Memory Test

In Front of the Bowl, oil, 8x8

I thought it was time again to get out from behind the photographs and work from a still life with my students at my studio. It's always a challenge to have a group work from a still life set up in my small studio, so I try and find creative ways to make it work. And I had already been pondering how to adapt a particular "memory" exercise for the studio and decided this could be a great way to handle a still life class.

If you've ever studied with Marc Hanson or kept up with news on his workshops, you probably know that he often has students do a "memory" exercise in his plein air workshops. I was once one of these "victims" who tackled this challenging, but eye-opening, exercise. In this type of exercise you view your subject in short intervals, and then paint in alternating intervals during which you can't look back at your subject.

I found that this exercise has a couple of beneficial results. First, it trains your eyes and memory to more closely observe the key elements of your subject before diving into your painting. But I think more importantly, you're able to keep your eyes focused on your painting for longer intervals without continually looking back at your subject, which allows you to make artistic decisions that will create a better painting rather than simply copy the subject.

For my still life memory exercise in my classes this month, I set up the still life in a separate room. It was actually my 10-year-old son's game room, which is adjacent to my studio...I had to clear a corner in this room and pay him $5 rent. ;-)

On the first visit to the still life setup, I allowed students to do a very quick sketch of the basic placement of the elements, to help get things started. (The setup consisted of two apples and a copper bowl.)  Next they went back to the studio and did a rough underpainting at their easel, and then continued with several alternating intervals of observing the still life and then painting (without peeking!) back at their easel.

Shown at the top and here below are a few versions in pastel and oil of my practice attempts (before my classes) and demos during class that I talked through in order to explain the process and give some tips on what to observe at each viewing interval.

Beside the Bowl, oil, 8x10

Apples and Copper Bowl, pastel, 8x10

Oddly, I like my very first practice attempt (at top) the best. I suppose the more acclimated I became with the subject matter, the more exact I tried to get with the rendering, and lost the fresh, loose approach I captured in my first try.

The benefits derived from an exercise like this will go a long way for the plein air painter trying to capture a quickly changing subject like a setting sun. Sometimes you only have about 5 - 10 minutes to capture certain lighting conditions in the field, and you may be better off just carefully observing and then painting from memory, rather than trying to paint a moving target. That's how I tackled the painting below, when I knew I wouldn't be able to paint fast enough. I did some minor touch ups back in the studio, but my photo reference wasn't very good and not much help, so even the studio touch ups were from memory and done really only to make a stronger statement of that moment captured in time.

Fading Fast, pastel, 8x10

Three-day Pastel Workshop in Traverse City, MI - July 23-25

Enchanted Evening, pastel, 16x20

I'm excited to be heading back up to a beautiful area of Michigan (Traverse City) next month to teach a three-day pastel workshop! In "The Pastel Landscape Simplified" we'll focus on...you guessed it...how to simplify the gargantuan amounts of detail that overwhelms us when painting the landscape. The initial block-in will especially receive lots of attention. The June issue of the Pastel Journal features an article I wrote on my block-in process if you'd like to get a little preview of how I approach things...

Workshop Details:

Art Center Traverse City
5152 US-31N
Williamsburg, MI 49690
fee: $320
July 23, 24 & 25, 2014; 9 am - 4 pm
Call 231-941-9488 or register online at www.artcentertraversecity.com

Last I checked, there's still room...Hope to see some of you there!

A Busy Week of Exhibits!

This week I'll have work showing in two fantastic exhibits that I'm excited to be a part of!

Thursday, May 15 is the opening reception for the Southeastern Pastel Society International Juried Exhibition at Oglethorpe University Museum of Art, 6 - 8 pm. This is a wonderful venue to see this top notch pastel show, and the opening reception is always well attended. Awards will be given during the reception, and refreshments served. If you're not able to make it on Thursday, the show will run until June 22. Admission is free to the public for the opening reception; $5 all other times. Oglethorpe University Museum of Art is located at 4484 Peachtree Rd. in Atlanta, on the 3rd floor of Lowry Hall.

"Unknown Territory" is my painting included in this show.

Unknown Territory, pastel, 14x18 (Sold)

Then on Saturday, May 17, I'll be part of a group show with three other artists. Our show, "Landscape Connections," takes place at the Artists Atelier Gallery & Studios along Miami Circle in Buckhead. The show runs until the end of May, with our reception this Saturday, noon - 4 pm, as part of the Art Walk which takes place each third Saturday of the month among the many other Miami Circle galleries.

Donna Biggee, Nancy Nowak, Jill McGannon and I have been plein air painting together for the past few years and have come together to show our landscape work, which will include approximately 30 paintings in pastel and oil.

The Artists Atelier Gallery & Studios is located at 800 Miami Circle, Ste. 200, Atlanta, GA 30324. Contact the Artists Atelier at 404-231-5999 or Atelier@bellsouth.net, or visit their website at www.artistsatelier.com. 

"September Goldenrod" is among eight paintings I'm showing in this exhibit. All work in this exhibit is for sale.

September Goldenrod, oil, 11x14

Keep Away From the Edge

River Edge, oil, 12x9

Vickery Creek Curve, pastel, 10x8

I've noticed that many of my students often fall into the trap of defining too many edges within the landscape too soon in the painting process. So for this month's classes at my studio, I revisited an exercise I did a couple of years ago Click here to see that earlier blog post, and from whom I got the idea. Although this approach works especially well for landscapes in hazy, overcast conditions, it can work for any type of landscape if you're trying to train yourself to be selective with your edges.

With this approach, you begin the painting without defining any edges, but to only block in the large shapes with soft, vague edges. This way, as the painting progresses, you can be selective with which edges to define, and which to leave "lost." I specifically chose subject matter that was packed full of fine details that we wanted to look past in the early stages.

Below are some progression shots from each demo, starting with the "vague," and not very "edgy" block in. (Except for that foreground rock in the oil demo...those sharp edges in the beginning must have snuck in there!)

Also a note on the oil piece, "River Edge"...I thought that small tree trunk crossing over the larger one would make an interesting shape, but I later decided that it's more awkward than interesting. I've already scraped out the smaller one. I may either leave it out completely or make it thinner. We'll see how it goes.

Workshops, A Group Show and an Article

Just held a two-day pastel/oil workshop at the Quinlan Visual Arts Center in Gainesville, GA. I enjoyed working with this enthusiastic group of artists who asked many questions throughout the two days. Many times students will apologize for asking so many questions. But groups like this make for more productive, and what I feel to be a more successful workshop. So if you take one of my workshops...ask away!

Below are my demos from this workshop (one oil, one pastel), with thumbnails and an initial block in for the pastel piece.

Zigzag, oil, 11x14

Bursting With Springtime, pastel, 11x14

My next local(ish) workshops will be in November...one in Austell, GA (oil) and the other in Dahlonega, GA (oil/pastel). The one in Dahlonega will be my "Composition Boot Camp" where I'll make more sense out of the thumbnails you see above.

My next pastel workshop is coming up in June, with the Pastel Painters Society of Cape Cod. A second workshop (2-day) has just been added and last I heard there are a few spot still left in this one.

Details for my workshops are on my website.

Tomorrow I'll be hanging a show with three other artist friends at the Artists Atelier of Atlanta, located in the Buckhead area of Atlanta. The show runs from May 2 - May 30, with a reception on Sat., May 17, noon - 4, during the Miami Circle Art Walk which takes place the third Saturday of each month. I'll post more details on this soon, but in the meantime, following below are a few of my pieces included in the show...

September Goldenrod, oil, 11x14

Orange Roof, oil, 8x10

Road May Be Slippery, pastel, 12x16

One more piece of news to share here...I haven't yet received my copy of the June issue of the Pastel Journal, but I'm excited to say that I'll have an article in this issue, in the "Skill Builders" section of the magazine. The focus of the article is on how I block in my paintings, which is typically one of the focuses of my workshops.

Harmonizing Structures and the Landscape

Tucked Away, oil, 9x12

This month in my classes at my studio we once again studied structures within the landscape. Last month's subject matter had more similarities in the local color of the white buildings and the snow on the ground, so it was a little easier to develop a cohesive look between buildings and landscape. This time, the structures have less in common with the surrounding landscape, so it's the artist's job to create that harmony. We addressed lost and found edges a bit as we did last month, but most of the focus was on harmonizing the color palette.

In my oil demo, Tucked Away, the red and pink colors within the roof of the barn were pretty easy to incorporate into the trees and grass. The shadows on the barn used a cool blue color that was used less liberally in other areas, but it's repeated in the sky and then darker values of the same hue were used in the darker shadow of the open garage door and also in some of the shadow areas of the trees and bushes as well as the cast shadow on the roof. Although not immediately obvious, the colors of the sunlit areas of the barn are also repeated throughout the painting. In order for those sunlit areas to appear bright white, they have to have a very warm contrast to the strong cool shadow areas. (In my experience, highlight areas like this need to be warmer than you might think in order to appear "sun drenched.") So those whites are really very light values of the golds, reds and pinks you see elsewhere in the painting.

Around Back, pastel, 10x8

In my pastel demo, Around Back, the subtle value shifts of the weathered brown barn provided a vast range of warms and cools to also incorporate into the greenery. The blue/gray shiny roof also provided a nice hue to harmonize the sky, rocks and some of the lighter shadow areas on the ground. However, I had more struggles with this pastel piece than with the oil demo. I finally realized this subtle value range also gave me so many choices that it was tough to narrow in on distinct color palette, which is why I think the pastel  piece proved to be more challenging. The strong lighting on the white barn in the oil piece was more clear cut with the values of the warms and cools.

In my painting journey, as I continuously move back and forth between painting in oil and pastel, the pros and cons with each medium are always very evident to me. In this case, with oil, even though you have the challenging task of mixing paint colors, creating color harmony can be easier when you limit your tube colors and continuously pull from these same colors. With pastels, it's too tempting to keep grabbing yet another color that just might work better. This creates an overly busy and disjointed color palette, and also of course...muddy color.

In this pastel piece, rather than continue to try and layer on additional colors as I wrestled with a chosen color palette, I brushed off the pastel from the surface and rewet the surface with alcohol so I could restart with a non-dusty "clean slate." After my class, I did this many times until I settled into a color palette. (Normally I try to limit myself to only fine tuning my demos after students leave.)

Rather than posting the progression shots this time, I've shown the reference photos below...

Upcoming Georgia Workshop

River Harmony, pastel, 11x14

I was invited to conduct a demo yesterday for the Georgia Art League at the Quinlan Visual Arts Center in Gainesville, GA. They were an enthusiastic bunch who asked lots of great questions! "River Harmony" is the piece I painted for them. I spent a lot of the demo time explaining how I plan and block in a painting, taking it a little more than half way to completion. I finished it up this morning back at my studio.

In a little over a week, I'll be back in Gainesville at Quinlan to teach a 2-day landscape workshop in oil and pastel. The dates are April 28 & 29 (Mon/Tues), 10 - 6, $250. These two days will be packed with information and exercises on composition, color harmony, paint/pastel application and the all important challenge of simplifying busy landscape subject matter.

Contact Quinlan Visual Arts Center to sign up:
www.quinlanartscenter.org
info@qvac.org
770-536-2575

Workshop Wrap Up - Mainstreet Art Center, Lake Zurich, IL

I enjoyed spending several days last week with a great group of artists in the Chicago area. Mainstreet Art Center in Lake Zurich hosted my 3-day landscape workshop for pastel and oil. Below are my completed demos from the workshop.

Winter Evening Magic Hour, pastel, 12x12

Rising River, oil, 12x9

With the pastel demo, I discussed the importance of the thumbnail "map" for deliberate, planned placement of every element in the landscape. The oil demo was an example of blocking in the painting with just five shapes.

We also did a day of "minimal stroke" exercises, which is always a real eye-opener for students. I demonstrated quick examples in both pastel and oil. With either medium, this exercise causes artists to realize what they need to think about before laying down each stroke. The oil painters especially realized how much paint they actually need to mix up and have on their brush before putting the brush to their canvas.

During the workshop, one resourceful student, Chuck Sisson, came up with a brilliant solution to handling some busy subject matter in his landscape. Thought I'd share. Below is Chuck's painting in progress and a detail of this painting beneath. 

Work in progress by Chuck Sisson.

Detail, resulting from a "carved" pastel stick.

Chuck had initially placed in these fern-like stems in a way that was rendering far too much detail and not accurately depicting the "thicks and thins" of the foliage. Many experienced artists usually try to simplify areas such as this by connecting shapes and pulling out just a few of the fine edges and details. However, Chuck, an experienced artist himself, came up with a different solution: He carved with a razor blade some indentations into the flat edge of a Terry Ludwig pastel to create a simplified pattern that he pressed onto the surface. I thought he made it work beautifully!!

My next workshop will be here in Georgia, at the Quinlan Visual Arts Center in Gainesville, located a little more than an hour north of the Atlanta area. This one is also offered to both oil and pastel artists, and will be two intensive days studying how to simplify and interpret the landscape. With affordable hotels nearby and plenty of great restaurants right near the art center, it's a great opportunity for out-of-towners to travel here for a short-term workshop. It's April 28 & 29 (Mon/Tues), 10 - 6, $250. Visit www.quinlanartscenter.org for more information and to register.