Studio Notes

Focusing on Gesture

2012-02-01T20:58:00.000-08:00

I've been having a blast painting the figure! I keep slipping deeper into abstraction, and I love it more and more.

One of the challenges of painting the figure from life is, of course the fact that the model has to hold the pose for a length of time. During painting sessions, I usually have the model sit for 20 or 25 minutes at a time, then take a short break, and resume posing. Some poses are easier to do and they can hold it longer than that. But the really interesting and dynamic poses are often very difficult or impossible to hold for more than a few minutes at a time.

I can take photo references and work from those, but I don't really like to do that because the experience just isn't the same. The visual, psychological and emotional interaction isn't there when working with a photo and it's just not as fun. The intensity is missing.

To get around the problem of difficult poses, I have been painting from rapid charcoal sketches, rather than painting directly from the model. The model can handle much more interesting poses if they only need to be held for two or five minutes, see.

The charcoal sketch on the left is a 2 minute drawing. Most of these sketches are 2 or 5 minute poses. Some of the longer ones are 10 minutes.

And essentially, I am only looking for information on gesture, form, and light / shadow patterns. I sometimes make notes on value variations if I thought that was important in a given pose. But as far as colors go, I decided I don't need that information because I never copy colors anyway, even if I did have a model in front of me the whole time. I make my color decisions subjectively, which is a part of my strategy for abstraction.

Gesture though, is paramount. I can't make that stuff up, so I have to work from life, and with very short poses I can get 1) more dynamic poses, 2) more poses per session, 3) a more intense experience, and 4) get to the point (recording only what I need and leave out distracting information).

When I'm focused on drawing the gesture, there is analysis and interpretation of the gesture and I find ways of emphasizing the movement, whether it be exaggerating a bend or stretching a limb, or may be making an angular area a little more fluid. I find it hard to do these things if I have a lot of time and am therefore tempted to shift my focus on other factors like color, or even capturing the likeness of the model.

So I've accumulated thousands of these little sketches - some are good, many do nothing for me - and I go through them and when I find something that catches my eye, I use it as reference to make a painting. The drawn figure, with all its interpretations of the original gesture, (as opposed to a faithfully copied figure) translates very well to painting.

At this point in the game, I'm finding that this method works really well for me. I can essentially have the short, gestural poses that I like, and still have the benefits of working from life.

To be able to render reasonably convincing colors, I do practice painting the figure from observation too. But these I consider studies and I just put them away.

An Alluring Balance

2012-01-29T12:59:00.000-08:00

Purple Haze, 40 x 30 inches, oil on linen

Got a nice mention in FASO's Informed Collector. Whoever wrote it - thank you very much!!

Smoldering atmospheric conditions, a myriad of shapes, and a cool color palate with just the right touch of warmth, combine to form an alluring balance amidst the busyness of the urban landscape.

"Smoldering". I love that adjective.

Archangel Michael

2012-01-25T22:48:00.000-08:00

Arcangelo, 24 x 20, oil on linen

This is a painting that I did recently of Archangel Michael. The original sculpture was created by Flemish sculptor and architect Peter von Verschaffelt in the 18th century, and it stands outside Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome.

Peter did the hard part. I just painted it.

Edges

2012-01-18T11:23:00.000-08:00

Sierra Rocks, 9 x 12 oil on linen

This is my first demo of the year, which I did for my landscape concepts class last week. I used a photo that I took last summer during my trip to the Eastern Sierras with a bunch of unruly ~~hooligans~~ artists.

Among other things, I wanted to emphasize using edges effectively. The basic idea is this; we have at our disposal a couple of options when it comes to edges –sharp, soft, and lost – and we need to use them deliberately, intentionally, and strategically. There are reasons why we use one type of edge over another, and it should never be done arbitrarily or thoughtlessly.

So when do we use sharp edges? In general;

The thing you're painting has a hard surface - rocks, glass, metal are much harder than grass, foliage and fabric.
Focal point. Sharp edges draw the eye.
Cast shadow edges are generally sharper than form shadow edges. (There are a lot of exceptions to this)

And soft edges;

The thing you're painting is soft.
Away from the center of interest, so you want to play down its presence.
Form shadow edges are generally softer than cast shadow edges.

Lost edges;

Simplifying a cluttered area by connecting shapes
You want to deemphasize an area even more than the soft edged areas.
Separation of adjacent "things" isn't part of the story so it's unnecessary. (If you lose an edge and it still makes visual sense, you probably didn't need that edge to begin with)

I'm sure there are other reasons to use hard/soft/lost edges, but these are the biggies.

and of course, there are exceptions to all rules and it boils down to whether a particular decision makes good compositional and conceptual sense, in the context of your picture.

In the context of my picture above, I might point out a few things to illustrate what I mean;

The rocks in the front and the rocks in the back are both hard surfaces, but the front rocks have a much sharper edge because they're the focal areas. The rocks in the back are "supporting cast".
Trees near the middle have sharper edges (though not enough take away from the rocks) than the trees away from the center of interest. Trees in the back have hardly any defined shapes or edges.
The edge between water and the rocks are lost. The separation of the two were unnecessary because the picture makes sense without that separation. It also simplifies that area into one shape, not two.
The reflection of the rock is softer than the rock itself.
Edges of the rocks where the form is turning away from us, is softer than the edges in the front. The sharp edge helps to bring it forward.
Trees all connect at some point or another - lost edges to combine multiple shapes into one. Simplify.
The water's edge against the lit part of the land mass is pretty sharp because there's quite a bit of value contrast there. As opposed to the shadowy areas. If I made all the edges along the water soft, it would look fuzzy and lose that glassy quality (even with the reflections present).
The front edge on the rocks where it turns from light to shadow is actually a form shadow edge, but it's supa sharp because the turning radius is so sharp. That's one of the exceptions to the rule.
Sharp edges contribute to the general crispness of the picture, which, in turn gives it a more colorful feel than it actually is. Subtle color differences lose their identities when the strokes are mushy.
The contrast between sharp and soft edges enhance each other's characteristic. Sharp edges are more meaningfully sharp when surrounded by (or played next to) soft edges, and vice versa. Arbitrary placements of sharp edges don't have the same sense of purpose and intent. (Well, duh!)

It may be helpful to think of sharp edges as exclamation points. When you're verbally expressing yourself, if you were to shout every word, no word is more important than the rest. Similarly, if you speak softly from start to finish, nothing in particular is emphasized. In order to communicate effectively, you'll want to know when to speak softly and when to punctuate with a !.

Metamorphosis

2012-01-11T09:51:00.000-08:00

No, not Kafka. I'm talking about making big changes to a painting and giving it a new lease on life.

This painting is not finished but I've spent quite a lot of time on it. I've been thinking about my decision making processes on this particular painting. There's so much going on (which was, now that I look at it, the main problem with the picture) that many conflicting ideas had be resolved. I got confused at every turn, but in rare moments of clarity I told myself "this is important. I need to write this down before I forget and become confused again".

And so here are some of my thoughts as the painting went through drastic changes.

This is where the change started. It was finished, hung in a show two or three years ago, and came back to me. It wasn't a bad painting, but my painting style has changed and it no longer looked like it should have my name on it. Too tight, too literal, too Hopper, too narrative, too cute.

At first I thought the tightness was what was bothering me the most, so I went over every surface, doing a looser version of it on top. If you've ever tried to loosen up an already finished tight painting, you know it's not easy to do. Much, much easier to tighten a loose painting than to go the other way. (there's a lesson in there somewhere)

But I knew it had to be done, and it could be done - I just had to keep going till the entire painting was loosened up because only then will I have a "loose context". A little bit of looseness in an otherwise tight context only looks like a mistake.

And then I decided that this painting relied too much on the narrative. The story there, like a scene from a novel. Nothing wrong with that, except I didn't want a narrative-driven painting. So I took out the car and the figures, the main players of the story.

Now I'm left with the set, without the actors. The visual elements such as the fire escape shadows and the striped awning became more important, and I noticed that there were actually a bunch of strong elements competing for attention. Is it about the fire escape, the cast shadows, the awning, the sign... Too many good things crammed into one picture. Too many statements.

As much as I hated to do it, I had to get rid of the awning. That was a tough decision (I really liked the awning!) but I think it was the right thing to do. It felt right immediately afterwards.

Once that was cleaned up, I noticed another BIG problem. Actually, I had noticed it long ago but was in denial, hoping that drastic editing of the elements would somehow solve my problem or may be help me fake it. No such luck.

What's the problem, you ask. It's the color vs. tone structure. Look at the cast shadows of the fire escape in the earlier versions. They have a lot of blue in them, and feel much lighter and airier. Toward the bottom of the painting, the shadowy areas are much more tonal, dark, and moody. This is a conflict of light conditions that doesn't make very good sense, even accounting for artistic license.

Do I want tonal and moody, or light and airy? Can't have it both ways. The tonal approach will give me a grittier, more somber, and perhaps a more timeless feel. On the other hand, the lighter, bluer shadows imply that I have a blue sky above the buildings, contrasting with the orange afternoon light. It implies a particular time of day, a particular kind of light, and that my intent would have to be to suggest that that's important. Is it about the color temperature shifts, or the patterns and shapes of the shadows?

I concluded that it was the latter. With considerable doubt, I took out most of the blue in the cast shadows. And I really liked the result. It's still got that warm afternoon light, but without making a big statement about color. The painting wasn't about pretty colors, after all.

Now I could see the overall mood coming forth, that of the afternoon sun, a mundane urban street, the familiar, comfortable yet slightly anxious feeling of living in the not-so-slick part of the city.

Yes, this is what I want. But the emptiness of the street seemed to be making too much of a statement. Why is it empty? Is it a ghost town? Did the plague wipe out the population? Am I making a statement about death and abandonment?

Hardly. But you see how my mind makes one association after another. Anyway, I put a pedestrian back into the picture, taking care not to overplay his presence. No bright colors or contrast on him. Let him lose some edges and be integrated into the scene rather than be the center of another narrative. Give us a sense of life but don't let the painting be about this particular person.

So this is where I am right now. I'm still working on it, but all the main issues are resolved, so I'm just tweaking edges and refining shapes and strokes. I like it very much.

Shape Driven

2012-01-06T09:53:00.000-08:00

Take A Seat, 16 x 12 inches, oil on linen

In designing a painting, I often look for and rely on strong shapes to carry the composition. Aside from the fact that the shapes are interesting to look at –that's a given. I mean who wants to look at something boring?– strong shapes are extremely helpful in simplifying a picture.

Consider this; In order for the viewer to understand what it is he is looking at, the thing must have visual information which communicate its identity. One can do this without color obviously, which is simpler than rendering something in full color. (You can look at a black and white photo of an orange and know that it's an orange) You can show the form of something by using a few values and manipulating light and shadow patterns. Using two or three values to do this would be simpler than say, using ten.

But if you have a strong recognizable shape, then it doesn't need anything else for the thing to be recognizable. A silhouette will do the job without the help of color or even value modulations.

I'm not saying that one should paint everything in cut-out shapes and ignore values and colors. I'm saying that if you have a strong shape, you don't have to be dependent on rendering color or value to make something recognizable. Light and shadow patterns and color are important in conveying your concept, but since you're not depending on them to play the role of defining your subject, they become tools for expression. In other words, rather than using color and value modulation to merely construct a sentence, use them to say something meaningful (because the silhouette already has done the job of constructing the sentence).

You might say, but one can do that and have them define the subject. Yes, absolutely that is true, and I'm not going to argue with that. I only make my point in the context of my pursuit for simplicity. If I can say what I need to say with less, why should I complicate the matter?

Anyway, that's my thinking for always looking for strong silhouettes. Failing that, my second choice would be to look for a strong light/shadow or light/dark pattern to define the subject. If I can't do that, I might just as well start looking for entirely new compositions because it ain't gonna work for me.

A 2-Day Workshop in September, South Bay

2012-01-04T07:58:00.000-08:00

Hey art enthusiast in the Bay Area! I just scheduled a two-day workshop in September. Yes, it's almost ten months away, but I thought I'd throw it out there for those of you who wish to plan ahead. (I give you fair warning; this workshop will be filled long before September!)

This is a plein air painting workshop hosted by the good folks at the Society of Western Artists in Redwood City, California (25 min. South of San Francisco). Open to all levels but some outdoor painting experience is highly recommended. (If you have none, hey, you got ten months to get out there with your easel!)

September 29 -30, 2012 (Saturday & Sunday) 9am - 4pm
$300 SWA members, $350 non-members

For more information and to register, please go to the SWA website.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-02T09:42:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! May this one be filled with art and inspiration. And peace. and love. and some really good wine.

I'm happy to kick off the new year with momentum; Urban Aria is featured currently featured in the online magazine, A Hopeful Sign. Check it out~

Happy Holidays!

2011-12-23T10:16:00.000-08:00

City Dwellers, 24 x 36 inches, oil on linen

I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday season and managing to hang on to your sanity. I think I'm doing better than usual this year, but it ain't over yet.

Artistically, 2011 was a great year for me. In the course of developing the Urban Aria series, I made some big breakthroughs in the way I see, and think about, painting. Consequently my work became more abstract and expressive, and I'm very very happy about that. I'm finally finding my voice! So it's taken me 20+ years and literally thousands of paintings and tens of thousands of drawings to get here, and it just feels like a tip of the proverbial iceberg, but at least I've found the iceberg.

Now that I've found it though, it's time to push myself out there. Therefore, 2012 will be the year for exposure. I dare say you'll start seeing me in more publications and juried shows. It's not 2012 yet, but I'm off to a pretty good start. the Painting above, City Dwellers, is already committed to California Art Club's 101st annual Gold Medal show. Though I've been a member off and on for years, I haven't really participated in many of their shows till now because, as I've said above, I didn't have a voice to push.

Also in the current issue of Plein Air Magazine, I have small mentions in pgs. 83, 94, 95, and 96.

Keep an eye on the February issue of American Art Collector, too. It'll be a cityscape issue, a good place for my work to be seen.

We're visiting family for the holidays so there won't be much painting - if at all - for the next few weeks, but if I get a chance, I'll try and post. I hope you have a safe and enjoyable Holidays too~

Stripped

2011-12-16T09:13:00.000-08:00

Stripped...of color, that is.

I'm a great believer in simple value structures. The fewer values you use to make your statement, the more impact you'll have.

These paintings are, obviously, done in black and white. Without color you're left with only values. I find it much easier because quite simply, there's less information to deal with. It also means that you can't rely on color changes to distinguish one area from another, so you really have to be sensitive to value modulations. Beginning painters sometimes find this very challenging, but it's as basic as understanding sentence structures. A noun and a verb will make a sentence. Addition of adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, conjugations, etc. will make a more complex sentence, but it can get very confusing, right?

Anyway, just a couple of values and no color to worry about. You can really (and you have to) pay attention to edges, brushwork, drawing and design. It might open your eyes to where you are weak. (And you thought color was the problem!)

Color is difficult to master, to be sure, but without solid understanding of the bones underneath it all, you're only faking it. So get your value groove on, Do some black and white studies (of any subject - doesn't have to be figures) and see how comfortable you are with the limited parameters.

You know what else is so great about just painting with black and white? It's cheap!

Process - A Recent Figure Painting

2011-12-13T09:15:00.000-08:00

As it is very difficult to convey what I mean by thinking abstractly , I thought I'd share process shots of one of my recent figure paintings. I think, even if I can't articulate all that's happening in my head and on the canvas, these shots will help to illustrate some of what I'm talking about better than showing you just the finished image.

This painting is fairly typical of the direction my figure paintings have taken in the past several months. My brushwork had been (slowly) moving towards becoming freer and more expressive for years, but this year it sort of made the jump from "describing body parts" to just plain "expressing".

Here's how I started the painting;

On the left is a charcoal drawing I did a few years ago. Probably a five minute drawing from the looks of it. I taped a piece of linen (Claessens #66) on board and loosely drew the figure with a pencil. The original drawing had a nice gestural quality, which I wanted to push further. I thought leaning her body a little bit more would add grace, so that's what I focused on.

Using black and Liquin, I drew over the pencil lines and mapped out the shadows. My aim here is to separate light and shadow clearly. Organizing the figure into two values simplifies the problem. (Hair mass represents a third value here, but that's not a function of light and shadow)

Now that I have my values organized, I'm ready to go in with opaque colors. (up to now I've just used black and painted transparently with the help of Liquin) I blocked in the shadows with a single color, for simplicity's sake. I didn't get into local color shifts at this point, because that would be moving towards literal description. Besides, I'm working from a charcoal drawing so any local color shifts would have to be made up.

I did the same with the light side of the figure. Single color, very simply blocked in.

I wanted to see what it looked like with a dark background, so I quickly filled it in, paying close attention to shaping the figure from the outside.

This is what my palette looked like at this point. You can see the four colors I've used so far; a dark color for the back ground, the black w/ Liquin for the underpainting, the light side of the figure, and the shadow side of the figure. Nothing really tricky so far.

The colors that I actually have around the edges of the palette are, clockwise from the bottom left;

Ultramarine
Cerulean (this is where I put a greenish blue. Sometimes Cerulean, sometimes Prussian, Sometimes Phthalo)
Ivory Black
Titanium White
Cadmium Lemon,
Warm Yellow (a mixture of Cad Lem and Transparent Earth Red)
Yellow Ochre
Permanent Red
Alizarin
Transparent Earth Red

I have filled in the rest of the background, and now sneaking in color variations into the figure. I have no references other than the charcoal drawing, so everything other than the construct of the figure is invented. This includes all colors, suggestions of environments. This contributes greatly to making abstract decisions.

Working variations into all areas of the painting, losing edges and finding them, pushing and pulling the paint. It's starting to look like a painting.

Finished. If I were working with a live model or a photograph, I'd be influenced a lot more by what I saw. The colors would probably conform more to actual colors, and shapes would likely be based on existing things around the figure.

As it is, the temperature shifts on the figure are sort of generic - at least, they start out that way and slowly become less literal as I respond to subjective color decisions I'd made outside of the figure.

I'll post more figures like this soon~

Go Figure

2011-12-07T09:17:00.000-08:00

Breanna in Red, 16 x 12, inches, oil on linen

So may be you noticed my preoccupation with abstraction of late? Well, I've been doing some figure work, hoping to apply what I learned about abstraction in the Urban Aria series to a different kind of subject matter.

Figure painting like this is a very different experience from painting cityscapes, and in some ways, easier to push abstraction because I'm not dealing with certain rules of representational painting like extensive perspective drawing and atmosphere.

What difference do those things make in terms of abstraction? I've found that they matter a lot, abstraction requires abstract thinking, and not just distorting shapes / colors/ brushstrokes here and there. In a cityscape (or landscape) painting, if I were to create a convincing sense of space, things like perspective and atmosphere must follow a set of rules which basically, go against this abstract thinking. It's really difficult to reconcile the instinct to follow the rules and that to break the rules. You can't do both. A perspective line is either correct, or incorrect. It can't be both.

How one artist works around that paradox differs from the next artist, which makes each artist's style unique. In effect, we're talking about how an artist analyzes and interprets the visual world; his identity.

But I digress - let's not get into the heavy stuff today! - As I was saying, with the figure isolated from the environment–that is to say, I'm not painting the surrounding environment – I'm not worried about things like perspective and atmosphere (OK, there's a little bit of that, but not much) and I can just focus on the drawing of the gesture, brushwork, surface work, color, and two dimensional design. And my colors aren't tricky. I just use few colors and paint them tonally. I've pretty much taken out the complex temperature shifts out of the equation, too.

The bottom line is, fewer rules of representational painting, more freedom to abstract. Drawing the figure is a rigorous discipline, to be sure, and has its own stringent limitations but figure drawing is something I enjoy immensely and besides, even in cityscapes and landscapes, drawing is one rule that I consciously try to adhere to. I don't break that rule.

And in Atlanta...

2011-12-06T09:17:00.000-08:00

I'm in another small works show – this one is at Anne Irwin Gallery in Atlanta. I have three pieces in this one, all 9 x 12 inches.

The paintings are a continuation of the direction that I started with Urban Aria. I'm pushing abstraction still further, by consciously using brushstrokes which do not necessarily conform to the form that it's describing. My brain is so conditioned to painting representationally that I automatically use strokes to help describe form. I'm trying to break that habit, and that means thinking about what I'm doing every time my brush touches the canvas and asking myself, now is this predictable?

That's not to say describing form is bad. Rather, I'm exploring what contributes to something looking like what it is. There's the local color, shape, form, value modulation, drawing, context... It's not necessary to use all these tools all the time, but if some are ignored, the thing suddenly doesn't look like what it should. What are the rules that govern which tools need to be used in what situation? What logic dictates which tools can be ignored, and when?

Is there really logic to this? Sometimes I think there is (not that I know what it is). Other times, I'm totally lost. So I continue to investigate.

You've seen this painting in an earlier post. All these are float mounted in 1/4 inch blond hardwood box, and are available from Anne Irwin Fine Art. If you're interested in adding any of these to your collection, please contact the gallery.

Small Works Shows

2011-12-03T15:06:00.000-08:00

Well I'm behind in blog posts! I should have posted these sooner, but Holiday craziness gets in the way of things, yaknowwhatimean?

These are 6 x 6 paintings float mounted in a wide 5 inch frame, and both of these are in the 6x6 show down at the Randy Higbee Gallery in Costa Mesa, Ca. As the title indicates, all the paintings in the show are 6 x 6 inches, and there are some sweet pieces in this show - if you're looking to collect but your favorite artists' prices are a little out of reach, these small works are sometimes the best way to get your hands on them. Smaller paintings, smaller price tags (generally).

The opening for this show is actually tonight (Saturday, 12 / 3... I told you I shoulda posted them earlier...) but there are many paintings in this show and the they'll be hanging for the holiday season, so you might want to check 'em out. Who knows? you just might find a small gem with a big name on it.

6x6 Show
Randy Higbee Gallery
102 Kalmus, Costa Mesa, CA
(714) 546-2156

Before & After

2011-12-02T19:04:00.001-08:00

For my in-studio landscape painting class, I usually spend about 45 minutes to an hour doing a demo on a different subject each week. Obviously, that's not a lot of time and I don't expect to do fully resolved paintings on the spot. I'm usually talking about some specific aspect or another, and I'll paint and talk until I make my point.

If I think my unresolved painting has potential, I'll work on it later in my studio and bring to to a satisfactory finish. This may take an additional hour or five, for a 9 x 12 painting (my usual demo size).

When I did this particular demo (above), my topic was simplifying complex things like cars, using atmosphere. I didn't spend too much time on composition or drawing, as you can plainly see. But I thought there was potential and I didn't want to let it go so I started reworking it later, when I was alone in my studio and away from any pressure to perform.

This is what I ended up with. It's changed quite a bit. I love the medium's capacity and tolerance for making big changes!

The placement of the figure is unconventional, and I kept moving it around but couldn't resist playing with fire. In the original demo, it's placed more predictably, and while it's sloppily safe, it was boring to me. I kept edging it to the left a little at a time (as if she was walking) and in the end, I decided to stick it right near the edge, but by manipulating the edges and directions of the strokes, I hoped it would work; or at least look intentional.

Anyway, a fun demo and a rewarding reworking experience.

Urban Aria Exhibition Catalogue

2011-11-27T13:19:00.000-08:00

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and didn't suffer too much from overeating like I did!

Now, it's time to get back to art before another onset of feasting and craziness.

I'm excited to announce that the Urban Aria exhibition has so far been received very positively. I continue to receive great feedback from people who visit the gallery. So here's a big Thank You to everybody who has taken the time to see the show, both in person and online! Your continued support and enthusiasm really helps me motivated.

So in connection with the show, I'm announcing that the exhibition catalogue for Urban Aria is now available directly from Blurb.com. Every painting in the show is included, plus a few "earlier versions" that may give you a glimpse into my process. I'm very happy with how the images printed, too; the colors look pretty damn close to what they should be, which, if you know anything about print publishing, is no easy task.

Anyway, here's a preview of the first 15 pages -

URBAN ARIA by TERRY MIURA | Make Your Own Book

The exhibition will be up through December, so if you haven't seen it and you find yourself in San Francisco, please check it out~

Thomas Reynolds Gallery
2291 Pine Street @ Fillmore
San Francisco, CA
(415)441-4093

Away From the City

2011-11-19T08:35:00.000-08:00

Old California Trail, 16 x 38 inches, oil on linen

This is a new painting. I haven't abandoned the city - just needed a little break. Painting the hustle and bustle of the city is exciting but after long periods of doing nothing but that... well, I can't think anymore and I need a mental vacation. So I go to this quiet spot, slow waaaay down, paint something that calms me down.

Tall eucalypti, muted "old" colors, solitude. Ahh, that's the ticket. Not a car in sight! No pedestrians! I hear no honking and no diesel engine noises.

This painting looks a little tight compared to my recent city things, but that's only because of its scale. It's actually painted pretty loosely. "Loosely" doesn't mean it's painted quickly. As I said above, I slowed waaay down. Thinking about each stroke as I put it down, trying to make it look nonchalant, but in the right place, with the right shape, and integrated into its neighboring stroke. Consequently, shaping these trees took a long time. I want them to look like they just fell out of my brush, but that spontaneity is an illusion.

I've seen other artists do it quickly and in single passes, but how they're able to do that is beyond me. May be I just need more practice or may be my brain doesn't work that way. I don't know. I'd like to be able to do that, but going slowly is kinda nice. Meditative. Quiet. That's what I was looking for in this piece to begin with, after all.

Happy Thanksgiving! Slow down a little, eh?

Painting What's Not There; An Interview

2011-11-13T08:54:00.000-08:00

The following is an interview about Urban Aria which appeared in Art Matters. I hope you find it interesting.

URBAN ARIA

Painting What’s Not There; A Conversation with Terry Miura

The title of your upcoming exhibition is Urban Aria. What is the significance of the title, and how did you arrive at it?

The word aria has a couple of definitions, one of which is Italian for air. As this series of paintings has heavy emphasis on atmosphere and its effects, I thought it was an appropriate title. The other reference for the word is musical – an aria is a melody, often a complex song in an opera. I often have musical references for titles of my paintings and shows (an earlier exhibition at Thomas Reynolds Gallery was entitled Andante) because I feel there’s a strong relationship between imagery and music, and I often think of my painting in terms of musical concepts. Harmony and rhythms are two of the more obvious examples.

Is this a new direction for you?

The genre isn’t new to me. I started out painting cityscapes a long time ago. There was a period of several years during which time I focused on learning the craft of landscape painting en plein air, but the city never left me. What is new this time, is that my work has become more abstract, both in terms of how I paint and what I paint.

What do you mean by that, and how did that come about?

Well, the brushwork is looser and freer than it has ever been. I don’t paint a lot of detail, so the shapes are simpler and less descriptive. Objects are merely suggested, not defined. I’ve been struggling to paint more abstractly for years and years, but being an extremely analytical person, I’ve always needed rigid structure. Rules of representational painting gave me that structure and I had a hard time leaving it. Consequently, abstraction eluded me for years. I mean, an abstract stroke made no sense to me, and I needed everything to make logical sense. Perhaps that’s why abstraction has always fascinated me; it was mysterious and out of reach.

It wasn’t until earlier this year that things began to change. I was painting on a street corner during the Sonoma Plein Air Festival. My subjects were cars and pedestrians, more or less familiar motifs. What was different for me this time, was the fact that I was looking into the sun. The backlit cars and figures...in fact everything in view became very simplified because you really can’t see any detail when you’re staring into the sun. I was forced to simplify, working with minimal amount of description. I have painted hundreds of backlit views before, but I believe this was the first time I tried it with moving targets. The simplicity forced upon my view by the back lighting, and the figures and cars in motion made it impossible for me to render anything. The only way for me to paint the scene was if I just tried to capture the impressions of things, and not the things themselves. Many an artist talk about this idea, and in fact I tell my students to do that too, but I hadn’t really grasped the full meaning of this way of seeing the world until I realized I was painting motion, not pedestrians.

Back in the studio, I pondered on this concept of painting the intangible, and I started a bunch of new canvases. I wanted to see if I could come up with other concepts which were intangible, abstract notions and paint them. Concepts such as airiness, noise, anonymity, and mood. When I focused on these ideas and not cars and buildings, the cars and buildings looked more like cars and buildings. And to my delight, the painting became more and more abstract.

Atmosphere plays a part in this, right?

A huge part. I’ve always loved atmospheric perspective and its ability to create mood. My landscapes are typically very atmospheric. In back lighting, because the sunlight has to travel through all that stuff in the air– smog, dust, etc. – the atmospheric effects are very much accentuated. And it bathes everything in a single unifying color theme, which, again, is a great simplifier. The fact that you can tell a backlit car is a car, tells me that you don’t need any detail. A silhouette will do. Adding detail doesn’t make my statement any more eloquent, so what would be the point in making that car more defined? Less really is more.

You mentioned musical concepts. Can you elaborate?

Right. In many ways ideas in music are very similar to thos in picturemaking. Even the words are the same; composition, rhythm, harmony, key. Those are formal concepts. It’s easy to see color harmonies as being similar to chords on a piano, and pleasing placements of visual elements translating to tempo and cadence. I’ve always been a big fan of jazz, particularly Miles Davis’ music from the late fifties. Not only that the tunes are very moody and atmospheric, but I love that he says so much with so little. It’s pure poetry. I identify with jazz, I think, because of its improvisational nature. The music has to have structure, like representational painting, but with jazz, you’re allowed to abstract and express, sometimes sticking close to the score, and sometimes going way off. Coltrane sometimes played entire songs without ever hitting the note as written, and yet, the tunes are identifiable. That to me is exactly what I try to do with my painting. I realize I have a long, long ways to go, but I feel I’m making progress. When I get stuck on a painting, I often ask, what would Miles do? And I answer myself with a famous Miles quote, “Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.”

Can you talk about your process? Do you use photo references or paint on site?

About half of this series of paintings are done using photo references. The other half are imaginary, composed from scratch. None are done on location. To me, plein air sketches are more like studies. I often bring them to a satisfactory finish, but my intent is usually to study and explore something specific; light’s effects, or the construct of a car or a building or a tree, for example. In the studio, I often just start with random washes on a small canvas, looking for shapes to spark a composition. I think of these as doodles, almost. I then tighten up the design and introduce some sort of structure, correct perspective and believable spatial relationships, all the while moving things around to try different placements. A great thing about painting cars is that I can move them around anywhere to suit the composition, as long as the perspective is consistent with the context. Once I have a design to sink my teeth into, I paint thicker and more decisively. I do many of these small paintings and have them all around my studio to give me more ideas. Not all of them are good but many will have a potential to be made into larger, more thought-through paintings. I may combine elements from two or more smaller paintings, recompose, and edit. In terms of actual application of paint on the larger canvases, it’s pretty much the same as small ones. The difference being with the larger one, I know where I’m going whereas with the smaller paintings, I don’t. It is hit or miss–and I have a lot of misses– but I like the spontenaity and improvisational nature of starting with doodley washes.

Is that the same thing as painting from memory?

I don’t have photographic memory, so it’s not as if I can paint exactly what I visualize in my head. But I tap into my memory for general feeling of being in a certain environment. I can remember whether it was busy or empty, tall buildings or a big open sky, many trees or few. That sort of thing. The rest is constructing the image on canvas with some attention to perspective. I always thought this was a good way to work because I can only actualize what I can remember, and I can only remember what I noticed, the composition is pre-edited to an extent. By definition, what I remember must have been worth remembering. I don’t remember colors too well beyond simple hues, so perhaps that contributes my palette being muted.

You’re known as a tonalist. Why do you paint tonally?

You know, I don’t even know what that means, really. I have nothing against bright colors, if the painting is executed well. I’m just drawn to a more quiet, muted palettte. I think it’s an effective way to create mood, and besides it’s a lot simpler. Colors of things are information, as with any other detail. If I can communicate what that thing is without local color information, why do I need it? It makes it more colorful, sure, but that has nothing to do with what I’m trying to express. Bringing a tuba into a sring quartet would make it more colorful, but it doesn’t make it better, does it? That’s not to say that I paint monochromatically. I do actually use a range of hues, just not very saturated. A strong single-color theme unifies the painting and if I throw in a few color accents in the foreground, I find that’s enough color for me. Any more would start to fragment the image.

A few of these paintings depict recognizeable buildings, but many are just ordinary, everyday type of views. Is that intentional?

Absolutely. It goes back to painting the intangiable. A recognizeable building would have to be painted...recognizeably. That is to say, the visual information not only has to be there, but also more or less accurate. The painting becomes more about the building than about, say city rhythms. I don’t really want to paint a portrait of a building or a car. I want to convey a mood. The more information I paint, the more specific the subject becomes. Keeping my views more ambiguous allows more room for the viewer to interpret, to complete the picture in their own mind, in the context of their own experiences and memories, and I think that is a far more powerful interaction than a realistic depiction of a recognizeable street corner can offer.

Since your subject matter is ordinary streetscapes, do you find that you see potential paintings everywhere you go?

Sometimes, when my brain is in that mode. Like right after a painting session. But most of the time it takes conscious effort for me to mentally translate what I see into a possible painting. It’s a lot of work, and since I have a habit of doing that while driving in the city, it can be dangerous! I prefer it if someone else were driving, but then I get car sick so that’s not good either.

Your figures too, are non-specific.

I’m painting motion, not pedestrians, remember? But seriously, I try to keep my figures less defined for the same reason. I want to identify with the figures in my paintings, and if they’re specific individuals, it’s not so easy to find resonance. I wouldn’t necessarily care about that person, because I don’t know him. But I can relate to Everyman, and keeping him anonymous by painting him abstractly, I can see myself being him. Not every viewer will identify with him the same way I do, but If I painted him with more detail and definition, I’m sure even fewer will be able to relate to him.

So this has been a particularly important series of paintings for you?

Working on this series was a completely eye-opening journey for me, unlike any other stage in my development as an artist, because I feel I discovered something very important. I feel like I finally understand how to break the rules of representational painting without violating my analytical self, and it’s absolutely liberating. I love how abstract my paintings have become in such a short time, and I love that I feel right at home after all these years of struggling to find my voice. I’m not there yet, but I believe I’ve found a piece of the puzzle. A corner piece, even.

Urban Aria is on view through December at Thomas Reynolds Gallery in San Francisco. Check it out!

Urban Aria Opening Was A Blast!

2011-11-07T09:55:00.000-08:00

The opening for my show was this past Saturday, and it was a lot of fun! Very well attended despite the gloomy weather. Thank you so much to those of you who made it to the opening - your presence there made the show!!

above: Me about to knock out the paparazzo. In the back is my good friend and artist Cindy Lemmon.

Fellow artists Sergio Lopez, Philippe Gandiol and Jimmie G. Jimmie, are you reading this? Let me know your website/blog address.

Richard Lindenberg discusses something with Michael Reardon (Might be something about art. or the bear market. I dunno)

Sergio and Philippe contemplate (somethin). James and Nancy in the back.

Me and James. We're kinda tonal.

My buddy from the sixth grade, Brad, flew up for the opening. He snatches the title piece from the show, too. Thanks Brad!!

Casual snapshot captures Michael Reardon, Sergio Lopez and Paul Kratter. Paul and I wore the same shoes. I thought you'd want to know.

This is my littlest fan, artist Skye Miura.

Erik Tiemmens and I went to art school together back in the late eighties. Always inspiring.

Ernesto Nemesio and Erik talk shop.

Christin Coy and Richard Lindenberg; always fun to hang out with.

Bill Cone, Paul Kratter and Philippe Gandiol. I didn't get to thank you for the beer afterwards Bill - so thanks!

Here's Sergio again. He's been tearing up the plein air circuit lately.

The show will be up through December so if you couldn't make the opening, there's plenty of time to see the paintings. If you get around to SF, please stop by the gallery and check 'em out.

Thanks again for all your support!

Now, on to the next project!

Without Atmosphere...

2011-11-04T09:29:00.000-07:00

Purple Haze, 40 x 30 inches, oil on linen

"Without atmosphere, a painting is nothing."

-Rembrandt van Rijn

That's one of my favorite quotes. Not surprising, eh?

The painting above is entirely invented. The atmosphere is the real subject matter, and the cars are er...vehicles... to express the atmosphere. In order to keep it that way, I made a concerted effort to keep the cars, pedestrians, and other "things" in this painting as simple as possible.

Dark values, highest contrast, visual activity are all concentrated in the foreground. As we move back into space everything becomes simpler, until light and shadow become so close in value that everything gets obscured. Buildings don't have any detail on them, and for the most part I rely on strong, recognizable silhouettes for visual clutter such as pedestrians and street light posts.

The idea there is this; it is much simpler to paint an object with two values than, say, ten. It is even simpler to do it with one value. But can I paint something with just one value and still make it recognizable? Yes, if it has a strong silhouette. When does a mere silhouette make sense? In heavy atmospheric conditions, and also when the object is back lit. Think of cinematic effects when silhouettes are used effectively. The first thing that comes to my mind is when Darth Vader emerges from the depth of a smoke filled corridor. What does that say about me? LOL But kidding aside, the next time you watch a movie, pay close attention to how a scene is designed. You'll find lots of beautifully executed scenes which are surprisingly simple, and heavily reliant on atmosphere and silhouettes.

Urban Aria opens tomorrow (Saturday, Nov 5. Reception; 5 - 7 pm) ! If you come to the opening, be sure to say hello~ I'd love to meet you!

Urban Aria Opens This Saturday!!

2011-11-02T09:42:00.000-07:00

Urban Aria, my solo exhibition at the Thomas Reynolds Gallery opens this Saturday!

If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area, I hope you can come to the opening. The reception is from 5 to 7 pm. Everyone is welcome - if you do come, don't forget to say hello!!

Urban Aria

Recent Paintings by

Terry Miura

Opening Reception: Saturday, November 5th, 5 to 7pm

Thomas Reynolds Gallery

2291 Pine Street at Fillmore

San Francisco, CA 94115

Something Wicked This Way Comes...

2011-10-31T09:13:00.000-07:00

Happy Halloween! And that means... yes, carving pumpkins! I've always enjoyed this part of the tradition, but I've never really done anything complicated. My Jack-O-lanterns have always been pretty much traditional.

This year, I decided to do something a little different. I don't know why - may be because I had just delivered all my paintings for the show and was feeling relieved and relaxed. May be because this year my daughter is old enough to really be excited about Halloween and that enthusiasm is contagious.

And probably too, because I had been talking with a friend about illustration, the occupation I am no longer in and miss a little bit every time I read a beautifully illustrated children's book at my daughter's bedtime.

Anyway, I decided to try the - I don't know what the proper term is - woodblock type of carving where you don't penetrate the wall all the way. Making use of the variation in the depth of the carving to achieve a light / dark value pattern but not cutting holes, it's a lot easier to do more complex images than the traditional method.

I had a cheap set of woodblock / lino cutting tools which worked just fine. I tried my Dremel, but it didn't have a pumpkin bit so it was just like using a clunky electric drill. Way too clumsy. Next year, I think I'll buy a Dremel specifically made for carving pumpkins and give that a try. But I have a soft spot for old fashioned tools, so I'll probably end up using the knives more.

The cat is Mooner, my trusty sidekick who had been with me for 18 years, during my entire illustration career and left us when I completed the transition to painting full time. This part of the Jack O Lantern is in honor of his memory. 'Hope you're having a good time Mooner, wherever you are!

Skye drew me a thumbnail - I'll post it later if I can locate it - of a spider that she wanted me to carve.

I didn't have a design to start with. This is all just ad lib, stream of consciousness. Not very different from my doodles that I do while mindlessly talking on the phone.

When I was a freelance illustrator, I had two distinctly different styles. One of them was gritty, newsy, digital collage with which I worked for clients such as SI, Rollingstone and Washington Post, and the other was like this pumpkin; whimsical and fun. The two styles balanced one another in terms of my need to be both serious and goofy.

Gotta have a witch! Elphaba lives! I love Gregory Maguire's work.

Another one of my daughter's requests; "Daddy, you need to put in a bunny!"

Skye's head on the spider; it's a "Skyeder"! Get it?

And here's the best part. This is Skye's pumpkin. She drew the face, and got a little help carving from ol' dad. Looks pretty awesome!

Ch-ch-ch-Changes~

2011-10-27T10:01:00.000-07:00

A.M., 12 x 16 inches, oil on linen

One of the beautiful things about thick paint oil painting is that it is almost infinitely editable. I say almost because if it gets too thick, surface texture becomes more and more a problem. Or an issue, anyway.

But my paint application usually stay within a manageable range in terms of paint buildup and texture, so I can make changes whether it's still wet or after it's dry.

The painting above is one that will be in my upcoming show Urban Aria at Thomas Reynolds Gallery (Opening reception; Nov 5th, 5 - 7pm). It says it's 12 x 16 inches, and it is, but it started out a little bit bigger.

Above is the same painting, at an earlier stage. It was 12 x 21 inches and while it had a nice back lit thing going, I felt it was a little too simple (less was not more in this case) and unresolved. So I went back in and worked on the main figure, which led to repainting everything around it because I needed all edges of shapes to be integrated. In turn, I had to repaint everything else too, for the same reason.

In essence, I repainted the whole thing over, which seems like a lot of work but it's pretty typical of the process when making changes on top of a dry surface. I brush on a thin coat of Liquin before I make changes on a dried surface and it sort of makes it feel like I'm painting wet into wet, but not really since there's no interaction between the dried strokes and the wet ones on top. However the coat of Liquin brings back the richness of the darks and brilliance of the colors, which helps me to judge colors and values accurately. This is pretty much what retouch varnish does. I use Liquin instead of retouch varnish because the varnish fumes make me sick.

Here's the detail of the pedestrian. The edges and brushwork are absolutely critical, and there's no way I can get the new layer to look integrated into the dried surface of the painting, so I have to repaint everything. When I point this out to my students when they want to make changes to their already-dry paintings, often I get a groan because they feel its a lot of unnecessary work and they don't want to cover up everything they've already done. Why should they repaint what's already working? But here again, is the notion of feeling too precious with the painting getting in the way of taking risks.

The plain fact is that if you want the look of wet-into-wet edges, the only way to paint them is wet into wet. And if that means painting the whole thing over, that's what you do. It's just a process. Nothing to groan about.

Oh and while I was reworking this painting, it became clear to me that the left side of the painting wasn't contributing anything to my statement so I took the panel to the table saw and BBZZZZzzzzzz!! Voila! problem solved!

Painting on Paper

2011-10-24T09:26:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been doing my figure studies on paper rather than canvas or linen. Typically, I use thick vellum which is smooth (with a little bit of tooth), translucent and a lot cheaper than linen.

I used to paint on this surface a lot when I was in art school since I couldn't afford more expensive materials for mere studies and exercises. I just recently rediscovered it, and am delighted at the fact that it works beautifully with my thick paint application of late.

It doesn't take washes well at all –not in the way I like, anyway– but I find I can build the surface toward thick paint without getting muddy. Paint responds to the brush in a more fluid way. It sort of forces me to be more aware of each stroke since I don't have the canvas texture to help me fake it.

These are all 11 x 14 and done in about an hour. In our three hour figure sessions, I do three of them. I just tape the corners of a sheet of paper to a board, and am ready to go. The paper itself is archival, if you were wondering, but I'm not worried about that - these are just exercises and studies and I do a lot of them. I'd go broke if I painted on linen all the time!

One thing that slows down a student's advancement is when he feels too precious about every little painting. Yes, it's important to try your best every time, but not every painting is going to end up worthy of a gallery wall or even a frame. In my case, for every one painting that ends up in a gallery, there's probably five or ten that do not. And if I start a painting knowing this one isn't gallery bound, I'm more likely to take risks. A lot of them fail and end up in the garbage, but so what? Can you imagine a musician recording every scale exercise for posterity?

Because the material is cheap, I don't feel bad about doing a ton of them. Set a time limit, focus on one issue, do it, and move on to the next one. As long as you are focused on a particular issue and you're not just going through the motions, you are getting better. And much, much faster than if you were trying to solve all problems in a painting every time you face the easel.

By the way, I'm Tweeting. Not sure if this is a worthwhile pursuit, but I thought I'd give it a try~ Follow me if you feel like it!

Recent Class Demos

2011-10-21T22:37:00.000-07:00

Here are more recent demos from my Thursday landscape class. I sometimes think ahead and prepare my demos to make sure I don't crash and burn. Other times, I take requests –often students have questions about specific issues that their trying to figure out in their own projects– and try to do my best on the spot. Riskier, but that makes it interesting too. Sort of like improv comedy. Except it isn't funny.

The pic at the top is my latest demo, done just last night. Among other things, I wanted to emphasize two things. The importance of paying attention to brushwork, and keeping temperature shifts between light and shadow subtle and under control. I used a pen sketch out of my sketchbook as my reference, so the colors are invented. Which was not a big deal in this case - both the tree trunk and the ground are kind of gray so there's no critical local color to worry about.

China Camp, I think? Gail was working from a photo and asked me if I could do a demo with it. My first reaction was, "hell no, that looks like a recipe for a crash and burn demo!" I didn't say that, but I thought it. Then upon closer inspection, I decided to give it a go. The clutter in the middle really was the only tricky part, and that was all in the drawing. Once I resolved that, the peripheral stuff was just back drop for the main dish. I believe that "strategy" of defining a few recognizable elements in a grouped clutter and leaving everything else loose, is what I focused on in the demo.

Here's one from a few weeks ago. I decided to do a street scape out of my head. The main theme here was how to simplify complex stuff like cars. I demonstrated how atmosphere and edge control can be used to accomplish this. It isn't about how to paint cars. It's about how to edit. Or more precisely, how to think in order to edit effectively. As you know, there's a whole lotta thinking required when you're painting but most of it has good logical reasoning to back it up.

Fog demo from two weeks ago. It's all about atmosphere, baby~ Organizing your values logically, I dare say fog isn't hard to paint (compared to some other climate conditions, that is). What's difficult is shaping the trees so that they're both interesting and convincing. Mine is just hastily done (these class demos are done in 30min to an hour usually) so it doesn't quite work, but another couple of hours would do the trick.

It's true that sometimes, reading or hearing about the hows and the whys of painting doesn't translate to problem at hand, even if the information makes perfect sense to us. But seeing it done right in front of our eyes is a whole different experience and we hear lots of "Ohhhh that's what you meant!" After all, painting is a process. A picture really is worth a thousand words!

URBAN ARIA Preview

2011-10-19T09:04:00.000-07:00

An American Gothic, 36 x 48, oil on linen

The opening of the exhibition URBAN ARIA is just a few weeks away! If you're in the SF Bay area, I hope you can stop by and check out the work and say hi!

I've uploaded the entire collection for your viewing pleasure! If you've been thinking of starting a collection or adding to your collection, here's a rare opportunity to purchase a painting before the show opens. All the paintings are available now (as of this posting). If you see something you just have to have, please contact the gallery directly.

Go to the online preview of URBAN ARIA

'Hope to see you at the opening!!

Getting Thicker

2011-10-15T22:34:00.000-07:00

Blues Jam, 24 x 18 inches, oil on linen

I'm nearly done with all the paintings for Urban Aria, which opens on November 5th. I started painting for this show about a year ago, and in that time I saw my style change a bit. Consequently, I had to reject some of the earlier pieces in this series because they no longer seemed to work with the group. They're good paintings and I still like them a lot, but I have this preoccupation with creating a show that's cohesive as a whole, and not a collection of different sides of me.

The very last of the bunch are painted thicker and loser than the earlier ones. It just gradually became that way over the course of doing three dozen pieces (of which 25 - 28 will be shown) I really am enjoying painting thicker. It sort of helps me look at paint as paint, rather than material with which to create a visual reality. Abstraction being one of the main concerns, anything that helps me think in those terms is worth investigating. Thick paint, it turns out forces me to think about the physical quality of the material, and less so about the physical quality of the thing that is being painted. I'm not sure if the distinction is important but it does seem to liberate me from being too literal.

I can't see myself going completely non-representational, because I'm not willing to let go of the structure provided by the recognizable. I need some rules, in other words. If all rules were thrown out, how do I know if anything is good or bad? Right or wrong? I'd have a hard time with that.

For now, thick paint and abstraction work well together, and I'm going to keep pushing it further.

Another Limited Palette Strategy

2011-10-10T10:39:00.000-07:00

Crossing Lines, 20 x 32 inches, oil on linen

This painting is one of the larger ones I did for the upcoming show, Urban Aria. And, it's one of my favorite ones of the bunch.

There's a lot going on this picture, so composing it was quite a challenge. One way I sought unity was to limit my palette (as usual) so that the overall color theme was very muted to begin with. In fact, in this particular painting I used a severely limited primaries palette of Ivory Black, Yellow Ochre, Permanent Red, and White. The black acts as my blue, in this case. It's surprising how much color - blue - you can tease out of black. It's all a matter of context, see. If you don't have a lot of saturated colors, Black + White look very blue, especially juxtaposed against warmer tones.

Yellow Ochre is my yellow, and like the black, is muted from the get-go.

My red is the only saturated color of the primaries, but I used it very sparingly. There is some red mixed into my "blue" to get that violet tone that's laced throughout the painting.

After the painting was about eighty percent done, I introduced a little bit of more saturated colors to mix my accent colors (pedestrian's clothing, mostly), but even those don't scream.

You may have noticed that this is actually the Zorn palette, used often in portraiture and interior figures. You can get very naturalistic results when painting warmer tones including and especially flesh tones. My painting uses the same palette, but pushed toward the cool end of the spectrum, and obviously, I'm not after naturalistic colors in this one.

One thing I like to do, to keep a very limited - almost monochromatic - palette painting from looking drab is to make sure I use a full range of values, and give it some snap by making good use of value contrast and sharp edges juxtaposed against soft.

I'm very pleased with the way this one came out.

Come see it in person - Urban Aria opens November 5th, at Thomas Reynolds Gallery in San Francisco. Opening Reception starts at 5pm. 'Hope to see ya there!

Figure Drawing Class

2011-10-05T09:41:00.000-07:00

My weekly figure painting class at The School of Light and Color will, starting this week, turn into figure DRAWING class!!

I love short pose figure drawing. (2 - 20minutes) I've always wanted to add a drawing class to my schedule, but I already have two weekly classes and I thought I wouldn't be able to add another class; I don't have enough time to devote to my own work as it is.

I thought may be someone else could teach it (and I could sit in once in a while) or we could start a weekly un-instructed session (like the painting sessions we do on friday mornings at SLC) but for various reasons, it hasn't happened.

Then I had an idea! How about I do figure painting class AND drawing class in three month rotations? I would teach painting three months, then switch to drawing three months, and so on. That way, I get to do both without adding a new class, and it will help to periodically refresh my students' chops, and keep things interesting.

We will be doing mostly 2 - 20 min. poses, emphasis is on gesture and shorthand form indication. (no jokes about "short hands" please LOL)

It's what I love to do, and I firmly believe that gesture drawing skills like these are absolutely essential to becoming a better painter. The discipline really forces you to learn how to say more with less. Line economy translates directly to expressive and meaningful brushwork. Shorthand form indication will be critical in painting with more decisiveness and confidence. No noodling the hell out forms here!

How important is gesture? It's the MOST important thing, as far as I'm concerned. Because it's the concept behind the drawing. You're communicating what the figure is doing, not what it looks like. It's the communication of an idea, in other words. Not mindlessly copying what you see.

The sanguine and white drawing on toned paper is what we'll be doing for 20 minute poses. Demos? you bet. Lots of em.

I'm really excited to begin this class! If you're interested in signing up, please contact the School of Light and Color;

The School of Light and Color
10030 Fair Oaks Blvd, Fair Oaks, CA 95628
(916) 966-7517

sarback@lightandcolor.com

More MSU; Making Stuff Up

2011-10-02T20:19:00.000-07:00

As the title of this post suggests, this painting is "made up". It's constructed from scratch, with no references. As far as invented cityscapes and architectural motifs go, a facade like this might be on the easier end of the scale. You can pretty much work up a composition in an elevation view, with no perspective to worry about.

Well, it's not exactly no perspective - there's a little bit of it like the underside of the fire-escape landing, and there's a hint of it in the sidewalk. The trickiest part of perspective in this picture is plotting the cast shadows. I know it's not completely accurate, but it's believable, and that satisfies my requirement. To tweak the actual shadows to suit my composition is more of a priority than them being precisely plotted.

To be sure, I have painted every element of this picture in some form or another in many other paintings (both from direct observation and using references) , so I'm fairly familiar with how they should look. And I did a couple of pencil roughs to nail down the design.

The most difficult thing about city paintings, for me anyway, is achieving unity. With all the separate little shapes and colors which may be very saturated, and not necessarily related to one another, it's up to the artist to unify them on canvas, and that's very, very tricky. Keeping the whole thing tonal and muted helps - A little bit of color goes a long way in this set up. Notice the green in the fire-escape and how close it is to the pale yellow of the wall - It's just a little darker, greener version of the same color. It could have been much more saturated and another artist might have taken that path, but for me, unity was more important so I modulated the colors accordingly.

Having just one bright color - orange in this case (and it's not even fully saturated, at that) in a sea of muted, close colors works well - it's a strategy that I employ often. I don't want to present it as a formula, though. It does get old quick if you don't have other ways to maintain interest!

On Making Stuff Up

2011-09-29T09:51:00.000-07:00

Many of my paintings are done from memory. Or more precisely, invented. Making stuff up, is what it is. I like to work this way because it frees me up from being tied down to what I'm seeing before me. It's much easier to edit, and move elements around to suit my composition. If I went looking for (and ended up using) a photo that looked like it could make a good painting, what really is the point there? Am I expressing something of ME? or is it just a painted version of a nice photo? And if the composition is already there in the photo. I wouldn't really be composing, either. I'd be just copying. I really have to think hard about what's the point of painting the picture in the first place. What is the concept?

Making stuff up is simply a fun and challenging thing to do. I enjoy it. It's my favorite pastime.(HAha~) The memory part of the equation has two parts. One is the overall sense of the place or scene, including and especially, the mood of the time and place. Being conscious about what sort of emotional response I had, drives my intent. I want to re-feel that same emotion by looking at the finished painting.

The second aspect of memory painting has to do with remembering just what something looks like. How wide should a sidewalk be, in relation to a pedestrian? How high is the walk/don't walk signal off the ground? Should the post supporting it be hexagonal, or octagonal, or square? cylindrical? If you painted these elements over and over and you make a note of typical proportions and shapes, pretty soon you'll remember them. It's called building your visual vocabulary, and it doesn't take any skill or much effort. You just have to make a mental note of things you paint, when you do have something to look at, whether from photos or on location. Obviously, if you're just copying what you see, you're not likely to build this visual vocabulary very much, and consequently you can't edit and make stuff up very effectively.

Carlson talks about the importance of painting from memory in his book - it's worth a read. In fact, if you're a representational landscape painter, this book should be on your nightstand or in your bathroom!

Urban Aria - Opening Date Change!

2011-09-26T09:20:00.000-07:00

There has been a change in plans - My solo exhibition, Urban Aria will open a couple of weeks later than previously planned. It will now open on Saturday, November 5th, 5 to 7 pm. Please make a note of it. If you are in the area (San Francisco) I hope to see you at the opening!!!

Urban Aria

New Paintings by Terry Miura

November 5th through December, 2011

Opening Reception: Saturday, November 5th, 5 to 7 pm

Thomas Reynolds Gallery

2291 Pine Street @ Fillmore, San Francisco

(415)441-4093

Cityscape Tips

2011-09-21T10:17:00.000-07:00

Coastin', 18 x 36 inches, oil on linen

This is one of the larger pieces for my upcoming show, Urban Aria.

If you've tried painting cityscapes, you know it's not an easy thing. (As if landscapes and figures were, right?) Obviously, there are many ways to approach it and no one way is the correct way. Sometimes I do a fairly tight drawing and use a grid system to blow it up onto a larger format. Other times, I just go in with a brush without a carefully laid out drawing on a blank canvas.

I prefer the free-hand way, because it just meshes with my personality better. The tight initial drawing is just so tedious! But sometimes I want a level of accuracy that I can only get from a carefully measured under drawing, like when I'm doing a recognizable landmark architecture.

This isn't one of those paintings, so I started it free-hand. Even so, I do end up using the straight edge to get long straight lines correct, like the perspective lines on the buildings on the right. There's no way I can eye ball those at this scale. (The painting is 36 inches wide) My hand is not that steady, see.

After the loose block-in of the main elements, I just lay my straight edge right on top of the wet paint and draw lines by scratching into it with a sharp tool (a pencil, or the back end of a brush). Does that mess up the layers underneath? Yes, but mine is a push-and-pull-back-and-forth type process painting, so it doesn't really matter. I rather like the mess the straight edge makes. It helps to integrate shapes and add visual activity.

Here are some of the points that I consider helpful in painting the kind of cityscapes that I've been doing;

Know which lines are critical. I don't have to draw every line. Perspective lines are obviously more important than those that describe little things like window trim and street signs.
Simplify the color scheme. Overall color theme (harmony) is more important than local color. Consequently, many of my cityscapes have a tonal structure that's almost monochromatic. Local colors are expressed as slight variations of this tonal color theme.
Most of the local color happens in the foreground.
In the distance, the color of the atmosphere (the color theme for the painting) dominates, and the local colors of things (trees, cars, buildings) become irrelevant.
When the painting is structured tonally like this, the jump between warm and cool temperatures need to be very subtle. If you want a big temperature shift, be subtle with value shifts between light and shadow lest you end up with completely unconvincing visual "reality". (If you're going for expressionist color, this stuff doesn't apply, of course)
Simplify by asking what is the minimum amount of detail I need for this object (car, tree, building) to be recognizable as such?
Integrate every shape into the painting. No shape or object should look like they're pasted on.
Lose an edge on every shape, if you can.
Have a strong focal point.
Never be afraid to scrape a perfectly good passage. If you can do it once, you can do it again.
Take out that detail on that building you just painted!
Take out that other detail too.
Take out a little more detail while you're at it.
Now put it back in to see if it's better with it or without it. Ask if the detail makes for a stronger statement, or distract from the overall impact.
Cars - pretend it's all the same surface - no glass in the windows, but it's solid painted metal surface. If the car doesn't read correctly by differentiating values of the planes, making glass look like glass will only look stupid.
Cars - pay close attention to ratios and draw them carefully; height:width, length:height, etc. Just how high is the trunk compared to the top of the car? You might be surprised to find out just how small a space the rear window occupies in the silhouette.

I'd better stop before this turns into a book! Anyway, these are some of the things I think about.

Music While You Paint

2011-09-10T20:57:00.000-07:00

Some artists, when painting on location, listen to music through their earbuds or headphones using an iPod or similar devices. Me, I usually bring my ten-piece harp ensemble with me when I paint en plein air. Something about the angelic background music triggers Divine inspiration.

....which doesn't necessarily translate to a better painting unfortunately, but I find it soothing nonetheless. Except when you're painting here in the Fair Oaks Village, periodic interruption by roosters crowing at the top of their lungs sort of ruins the effect.

Back in the Studio

2011-09-08T09:44:00.000-07:00

Summer Passing, 15 x 30 inches, oil on linen

Well! I guess my summer is over. The kids are in school, and I have no more expeditions on the calendar. It's back to the grind, folks. Back to work. (I consider my trip to the mountains work, but some may disagree.)

For the next month or so, I will be focusing (hopefully) on finishing up the suite of cityscape paintings for my solo show coming up. I will post more on that very soon, but first, I had to finish a few larger landscape paintings for Anne Irwin Gallery's group show that's opening next weekend.

The image above is that of a painting I just finished and sent out yesterday. I also have sent them a few city themed paintings, one of which is a variation of my earlier motif;

I was going to include this in my cityscape show, but as the series evolved and became more abstract and urban-themed, I began to think may be this didn't fit in so well. I still love this painting, but I have in mind to create a show that's more cohesive than my previous efforts, I decided to send this one off to Atlanta, where it'll be with my other paintings with which this guys feels more comfortable.

Anne Irwin Fine Art

"Best in Show" Anne Irwin Fine Art Anniversary Show

Opening Reception September 16, 6:30pm -8:30pm

If you're in the Atlanta area, be sure to check it out!

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 6

2011-09-05T08:31:00.000-07:00

After breakfast, we struck camp and got ready to hike down. Mules came up, lead by a couple of wranglers on horses. You can see in this photo, our junk being assembled in the back while the beasts wait patiently. There were a dozen or so mules, which seems like a lot but at least a third of them were for the kitchen stuff. A week's worth of food were carried in in metal bear-proof boxes. (and we ain't talkin' 'bout no freeze-dried astronaut food, either) And though we ate all that, the boxes still needed to be packed out.

One last view at our meadow. Look at those beautiful clouds. Thundershowers were predicted later in the day, so we hurried out.

Paul stopped on the way to do a last bit of painting. That's one advantage of an Open Box M set up. It's very compact so you can carry all of it with you, allowing you to stop and set up along the trail. My set up was much bulkier and heavier, (Soltek + French Companion fitted w/ glass) so I let the mules bring it back. All I had in my back pack were ten paintings on 1/8 panels, stashed in two Raymar plastic panel carriers. And lunch, and a bottle of water. We had plenty of time to do a painting on the way down, but I wasn't going to lug all that gear (35 lbs) for three and a half miles.

Not stopping on the way down means extra time at the bottom of the hill for.... pie and beer! I had a slice of cheddar pear and it was amazing! Perhaps it was the altitude, or maybe after a week of camping and miles of hiking, any pie tastes good, but seriously, the pies they make here are some of the best I've ever tasted. It might just be the best kept not-so-secret secret this side of the Sierra. If you're ever travelling on Hwy 395, take a short little detour to enjoy a slice of pie here. You won't regret it. But get there early! They often sell out before noon.

And the ice cold beer after a hike? Better than a hot shower.

And thus concludes my painting adventure in the Sierras this year. Breathtaking views, (there's a pun in there somewhere) great food, and wine, and lots and lots of painting with people who speak my language. What could be better!?

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 5

2011-09-04T16:11:00.000-07:00

By Friday, the general fatigue was catching up to me. I just couldn't get up early enough to do a pre-breakfast painting. Though I did get up in time for breakfast.

The pic above is Paul and Timon, eating their breakfast. It got pretty chilly in the night time, and before the sun reached our little camp area, we had to be dressed pretty warmly. As soon as the sun hit, though, it got very warm.

Here's Daniel painting in the camp area. I think he was painting the "kitchen".

My crib.

Daniel, Jim, and Bob, relaxing after a hard days work.

Well I did four paintings on Tuesday, three on Wendsday, two on Thursday. I am trending down, I realized, and I resolved to do three on this day. Here's my first. I realized that I didn't have any paintings of "big views" yet, even though we were surrounded by them. I guess my interests were elsewhere. But since we are here, I just had to do one.

This painting also features a bit of blue. It is a running joke among my friends that I never use any blue, so here ya go, Paul. Granted it's only a tiny bit of the canvas but it's still blue, eh?

This is the little thumb. Nothing fancy.

Well the perfect Edgar Payne clouds started to get bigger and darker, and I smelled rain. I packed my things and hiked down to base camp, and shortly thereafter, we were hit with a downpour. So much for my goal of doing three paintings!

Rain came in fits so every time it let up, we became hopeful and set up. but then it would start dumping water on us so I quit. A few of us braved it, using umbrellas and what not to keep their work dry. I can't be bothered with such apparatus so I just sat under the tarp and drew Jim painting.

If it's not a thumbnail for a painting, my drawings in the sketchbook does get a little more involved.

Bill and Timon spent the rainy afternoon under the tarp playing chess. Is it happy hour yet?

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 4

2011-09-02T09:40:00.000-07:00

Day 4. Thursday. Another glorious morning to get us started. Actually, I slept in and missed the pre-breakfast painting session. Shame on me. In fact, I almost missed breakfast! I blame it on not being able to sleep well at night due to bear activity.

But that's a lie. We had no bears. Only chipmunks and ground squirrels, but they don't make good camp stories, do they? It was probably just the wind that kept me up.

Anyway when I got up most everyone was already done with breakfast and was assembling their lunches. That was the m.o. - Gene lays out all the lunch meats and snacks, and we build our sandwiches and stuff 'em into brown bags to take with us on our daily painting excursions so that we don't have to hike up and down just to eat.

Bill is still eating his breakfast, and everyone else is making their lunch. I've yet to eat my eggs and sausages.

Left to right; Paul Kratter, Sharon Calahan, Daniel Aldana, and Ernesto Nemesio.

A late start but thanks to the vertical-ness of my subject matter, the shadow patterns remained interesting for a long while. This is up at Gem lakes. I did a painting from the same spot last year, but I can't seem to find a shot of it right now. I'll post if I find it. I did put more color in it this time. (which in my case, doesn't mean a whole lot. LOL)

Here's the thumb for my painting. I've been doing these quick two to three value organizations lately. Very helpful in simplifying the structure.

Here's Bill Cone, with his pastel set up. Notice the stance mimics the tripod.

For my second painting, I decided to do a value study. I was tired after the first one, and thought it would be easier to limit my colors. Turns out, it was harder, not easier! I used Ultramarine, Transparent Oxide Red, and White. No yellows. It really took a lot of effort to wrap my mind around the fact that I have no green to paint those trees. It was a challenging and rewarding exercise. I think I'll do more of these in the future.

Thumb.

Daniel squinting to see the values.

Here's Jim. Doesn't he look like an ad for plein air painting gear?

We ended the day with nice juicy steaks with red wine - mushroom sauce. Doesn't get much better than this!

We Interrupt This Program To Bring You...

2011-09-01T08:27:00.000-07:00

We interrupt this program to bring you news of a plein air painting workshop happening next weekend! (Friday, September 9 - 11)

I still have spots open for this workshop, which will take place locally here in Fair Oaks. We'll be painting in and around the quaint Fair Oaks Village, plus an additional location for a more landscape-y subject matter. There'll be demos and plenty of one-on-one at the easels.

Many students have expressed interest in painting city scenes - Fair Oaks Village is not exactly urban, but it has some neat old storefronts and street charm, as well as a nice park with big trees so there is good variety to paint, both man-made structures and more organic, natural motifs.

One nice thing about doing a workshop locally is that should the weather get too hot (a distinct possibility in this part of the world) we just go indoors into the SLC's classroom and work from studies and photos. And my studio is right there next door too, you can check out in person all that you've seen on this blog recently and I'll be glad to talk about studio processes (working from photos, the role of the computer, scaling up a study, making panels and stretching canvases, etc. etc.) should any student be interested.

And yes, the elusive book En Plein Air, 80 pp of full color, fully illutrated painting secrets (OK, there are no secrets. Just stuff I learned from experience) is included in the workshop!

This book is only available as a part of my workshop. To many of you who has written me inquiring about purchasing the book, I'm sorry - I only print enough for each workshop so there are no extras and I don't have plans to make it available for purchase at this point. May be at some point in the future, but no immediate plans.

The workshop will start on Friday afternoon, to give students time to get here. We'll do a 3 hr demo first thing, and should you want to stick around and paint, there's plenty of light left yet. Alternatively, we can go back to my studio (just a block away) and examine some ~~wine~~ paintings. Either way, we'll have a good time.

On Saturday, we'll paint all day outside, unless it gets too hot in the afternoon - then we can work indoors. At the end of the day we'll do a crit, and have some more ~~wine~~ art discussions.

On Sunday, we'll drive out to a different location - 10 minutes away - for a change of scenery. I'm thinking...water and reflections...

Anyway, that's the plan. If you want to join me for this workshop, please contact the School of Light and Color.

Plein Air Painting Workshop with Terry Miura
September 9, 10, 11 (Friday afternoon, all day Saturday and Sunday)
$325

The School of Light and Color
10030 Fair Oaks Blvd Fair Oaks, Ca 95628

(916) 966-7517 email:sarback@lightandcolor.com

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 3

2011-08-31T22:27:00.000-07:00

Ahhh... coffee... It's not Peet's, but any coffee tastes so good at 10,000 ft at sunrise. Bits of coffee grounds in my mouth don't even bother me.

I woke up early again - but not as early as some who are more disciplined than I - and set up to do this painting;

You'll have imagine this painting without the light on the trees, for that's how it was. The inclined wall behind the trees went up another coupla thousand feet, and the sun was coming over that. I was anticipating the "first light" on the trees and I painted them accordingly. Although I was ready, the sun wasn't coming as quickly as I expected and I was called for breakfast. I wasn't going to miss a hot breakfast so I painted a made-up light and went to eat.

It was way past the "first light" when I returned to the scene of crime and I saw immediately that I got it wrong. I should have painted the trees top lit, with a little bit of rim light. Instead I got the light coming from the wrong direction! Ah well, live and learn. I didn't bother to fix it. Instead, I packed it up and hiked up to Gem Lakes to do my next painting.

I didn't have to hike too far to find this granite slab basking in the morning sun, and in a very quiet corner of the Gem Lakes area. I felt so isolated that I kept looking over my shoulder expecting to see a bear or something. The water's simultaneous reflection and transparency was what intrigued me. I've seen other artists do it with considerable skill and I wanted to try it too. It turned out to be a fun challenge.

Satisfied, I went looking for my friends who I knew were painting somewhere in the vicinity. I found them on the far side of the Gem Lakes area, doing some fab pieces. Very inspiring. I don't have photos of their work but hopefully, by the time I wrap up my report of the trip, some of them will have posted on their own websites / blogs, and I can post a link to each. It should be an interesting comparison.

My afternoon painting (above) was a bit of a struggle. I didn't plan well, and didn't anticipate the shadow patterns changing on me so dramatically. I should have known better than to paint a near vertical cliff at mid day! When I started, the cliff's face was in the sun, but an hour later it was totally in shadow. As I hadn't quite reached the point of defining the light and shadow patterns sufficiently (in order to go on without relying on the view) I was forced to scrape most of it and start over.

I like the painting I ended up with, although it's not what I wanted to communicate in the first place. Such is the way the cookie crumbles sometimes when painting en plein air.

Afterwards, I packed up, hiked down to base camp, took a shower out of a bag and washed my hair and shaved. Felt good to get the grime off but boy, dousing my face with Deet immediately after shaving was a painful experience! It was either that, or be eaten alive by mosquitos, which were aplenty this year.

Sipping wine and eating dinner that Gene prepared for us, we talked shop as we watched the light slowly change on the faces of the mountains. There was no moon, and the night was clear, so the stars filled the sky like something exploded. The milky way clearly looked like someone spilled milk across the sky. Awe inspiring.

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 2

2011-08-31T09:20:00.000-07:00

So Tuesday was the first day of painting for me. I got up at sunrise, as did everyone else, had two or three cups of cowboy coffee (already brewing on the camp stove by the time I crawled out of my tent - nice!) and got started on my first painting. I knew that I wanted to do the same view as my last year's first sketch. Not exactly the same, obviously, because it was a different time of the day, and I don't think I set up at the same exact spot either. No matter, I just thought it would be kinda neat to compare the two and see what changed in the way I see and paint.

Here's my thumbnail for the painting. Rather rough and loose. The idea for the composition wasn't complicated so it didn't require too much investigation before I stared.

And below is last year's painting of the same scene.

Now that I look at it, it doesn't even look like the same spot. The angle was obviously different since I can see trees in the background - and this was more of a closer study of the boulders than this year's sketch, which looked at more of the peninsula.

With one painting done, it was time for breakfast. I don't usually eat breakfast at home but boy was I hungry. Eggs and bacon really hit the spot~

After breakfast I set up my easel just down the hill from my tent and tried this view;

By now the sun was up and hitting the tree masses from the far side, giving me a nice rim lit tree mass against a still-dark background. The violet in the background is a subjective choice here. It wasn't really that color - I was playing with the idea of structuring my painting around orange, green and purple - orange in front, green in mid distance, and purple in back. The purple is a little strong but otherwise I'm happy with this experiment.

da tumnail.

Here's the view. More or less.

Michele deBragança doing her morning painting not too far away from my set up.

Next, I turned my easel 90 degrees and painted this view. The shadow pattern on the hill caught my eye. The challenge was balancing abstraction with organization. I expected this to be more abstract since it's all bushy and organic - A few shrubs at the bottom and the trail going up the hill provide some structure, but I struggled with the opposing urges of making my trees solid and simple (more like the previous painting) versus making them completely abstract. The result looks to me like I couldn't make up my mind. Haha~

Indecision screams.

Here's my thumbnail. What I see from this is that I deviated from my original plan, which is to treat the darkness of the trees and the shadows on the hill as one unit (more or less). In other words, I got a little too literal in places, (seduced by the thingness of things) and that's where I went wrong.

Here's Timon, doing his pastel thang, not too far away from me.

After lunch, it was time to slow down and recharge. I tried to take a nap but was too excited. Still, I can't sustain the level of focus painting requires for long, so I forced myself to rest for a few hours. Gene, our cook, made a little afternoon snack / pre-dinner appetizer. Look at that apple swan thing! And camenbert? Fancy eats at 10,500ft, folks~ this is roughin' it. :-)

The sun is going down to the Western mountains, and the shadows are lengthening. We are in the valley surrounded by high peaks so on the valley floor the sunlight is gone fairly early. The surrounding mountain tops continue to be illuminated in glorious light for hours afterwards) I was more interested in painting my immediate surroundings than big views, so I needed to take advantage of the light before it disappeared. This is Bob's and Paul's tent.

...and the thumb.

For dinner Gene cooked chicken, but gave us a choice between white wine and tarragon sauce, or ginger orange sauce. Talk about gourmet camp food! Gene's about as rough looking as any cowboy / pirate as any character NC Wyeth painted, and has the voice and the demeanor to go with it. Can you imagine the phrase "you have a choice between white tarragon sauce, or ginger orange sauce" coming out of such a character? The disconnect was pretty funny. And we all enjoyed the meal very much.

Sierra Pack Trip - Day 1

2011-08-29T22:06:00.000-07:00

So we got up early and caravanned to Rock Creek Pack Station. We dumped all our stuff onto the loading dock and then enjoyed our coffee and breakfast provided by the pack station.

Because we have to haul up our art supplies as well as camping gear, we can't really do it all on our own two feet. Fortunately, mules can do the job for us! That doesn't mean we hike up empty handed, no. Mules cost money so we were somewhat careful about how much stuff we brought, and anything over the weight limit, we had to carry on our backs. I opted to carry my palette (among other things) with me because it's fitted with glass, and I didn't want to trust it to the rough handling of the cowboys and their beasts.

Our base camp is at Chickenfoot Lake, which is a relatively easy 3.5 mile hike with only a 500ft in elevation gain. (SO much easier than getting to Ediza!) The trails are well worn, and the scenery is spectacular from the first step. We got there in no time. In fact, it was only 10:30am when we arrived at the base camp location. The mules weren't going to be there for another few hours, so we decided to eat our lunches and hike up to Gem Lakes, a collection of beautiful small lakes just 15 or 20 minutes higher up the mountain. (11, 194ft)

This is Long Lake, one of the three (?) lakes along the hike up to our base camp.

Up at Gem. There's more snow than last year, thanks to a long, wet season.

Since we didn't have all our gear with us, and we wouldn't have them until the mules arrived, a few of us decided to hike further up the mountain. Treasure Lakes were just a few hundred feet higher. I don't know how but we clearly did not follow the easiest path. We ended up scrambling up boulders and had a bit of a time getting up there. But the view from above was well worth the exertion.

That's Ernesto on the rock and Bill to the left. At this elevation, even a little bit of climb is a workout. And we were all challenged by even the easier climbs, not to mention trail-less boulder hopping that we had to do at times. Except Ernesto, who seem not to notice the thin air or the tricky footing. He went up and down any terrain like a mountain goat and left the rest of us in the dust every time. Ah, to be young...

You don't have to be Edgar Payne to want to paint this stuff. Just amazing views everywhere we looked.

By the time we returned to the base camp, I was thoroughly exhausted and didn't feel like painting anymore. Besides, there were chores to be done, like assembling my tent and filling bottles of water and the sun-shower thing. What extra time I had, I just drew in my sketchbook.

This here drawing is Paul and Bob, sitting around waiting for chow time.

They kept moving around, so I turned around and sketched some stuff that didn't move so much.

So on this day (Monday) I did not paint. Too wiped out from the hike. I did get plenty of ideas and inspiration from the other members who were not too tired to set up and paint near the camp. Come morning, I resolved to do a painting from the same location as my first painting from the year before, to see if much has changed in the way I see, or the way I handle color / paint.

Gene, our cook, made a fabulous dinner of hamburgers, pasta salad, beans and I can't remember what else, but it reaaaally hit the spot.

Cook? yes, we had a cook with us, to do all the food stuff, including clean up. That is one of the things that makes these expeditions so awesome. We just paint, and not worry about cooking or cleaning. As luck would have it, Gene was amazing, and we ate VERY well.

My next post will feature some paintings. I promise.

Sierra Pack Trip

2011-08-28T22:25:00.000-07:00

I just returned from a wonderful painting trip from the Eastern Sierras where, along with eight other artists and a photographer, I spent six days painting at 10000+ ft elevation. It was awesome!

As with past such trips, I want to do a day-by-day, blow-by-blow report of the trip. I do have lots of pics to share so I think it best to try and post in manageable chunks.

I'm still kind of exhausted so this post will be just a short one, to set the scene for the next bunch of posts.

This is my third painting trip to the Sierras, and this year's destination is the same as last year's; Chickenfoot Lake and Gem Lakes. We hike in from Rock Creek Pack Station, some 20 minutes South of Mammoth.

But that's tomorrow. The first day is spent just getting there - from where I live, it's about five and a half hours driving. Since I got a speeding ticket last year, I was really careful and drove like a snail. Still, the beautiful scenery down Hwy 395 kept me engaged and it felt like I got down there in no time.

We met up in Mammoth, and as tradition dictates, headed over to the Taproom, a dinky little bar where we drank beer and caught up with each other's recent adventures in art. We arrive here a day before the hike-in to acclimate ourselves to the elevation a little bit. After all, we will be spending the next several days at 10000 - 11000 ft above sea level, and that's not something to take lightly.

Beer flowed and one by one, all the members showed up at the Taproom. (Except Daniel, who would meet us in the morning at the pack station) . We headed over to Slocums Grill for one last civilized sit-down dinner before a week of roughin' it. (If you heard me say it, you'd detect a bit of irony. But more about that later)

Stuffed with excellent food and wine, and excited about the adventure, we returned to the hotel and turned in early.

-to be continued-

Using Photo References

2011-08-09T15:10:00.000-07:00

Coming and Going, 12 x 24 inches, oil on linen

About half of my city paintings are done from photos. The other half are invented from scratch. (Or if you prefer, painted from memory. They mean the same thing to me.)

For this new painting, Coming and Going, I used a snapshot that I took a few years ago. It really does look like just a mindless snapshot, doesn't it?

As you can plainly see, I did take liberties with color, value structure, and editing. Photo references are just that; references. I use them for information about specific things, usually the construct of things that I can't easily make up, and perspective of its immediate environment.

I ignored color information for the most part. Usually the colors in photos are too...photographic, which looks nothing like reality so I don't rely on photos for information about color. The yellow-orange of the near trolley is the only thing that that I referenced. Even then, it's just a general hue direction, and not even close to matching the colors literally.

My color structure is made up, obviously. It's based on a blue near-monochromatic tonal structure. I added some warmths in the lit areas, and added a few subtle color notes such as the aforementioned trolley.

The value structure is more or less determined by atmospheric perspective. The closer the object, the darker the darks. The farther we go back, the lighter they become. (and the value range between dark and light narrows) So it's very systematically organized, though it may not look like it at first glance. The expressive brushstrokes and lost edges disguise the fact that it's logically laid out.

Also, I edited heavily. The pedestrian and the cars in the fore, the bus behind the trolley, background detail and cables... I make my editing decisions based on composition and concept. Will this element help me tell the story more clearly? or is it just fluff. If it's a necessary element, is it in the right place? If not, where should it be? Questions like that help me solve editing problems with logic.

The important thing to remember is that a photo reference is not something to be copied. If you were attracted to a photograph because it was so beautiful, what would be the point in painting it? I'd just as well frame the photo and hang that - much faster :-D

Kidding aside, I think it is important to be conscious of the reason why you are using a photo reference. In the end, I want my paintings to be expressions of my identity, not a painted copy of a photograph. I may need the help of photo references to do that, yes, but I never want to be a slave to them.

Ch-ch-ch-Changin'~

2011-08-01T11:54:00.000-07:00

City Noises, 12 x 24 inches, oil on linen

So I continue to explore abstraction, in terms of how I paint and what I paint.

This painting in particular, has taken an interesting path. It originated as one of the pieces I did during the Sonoma Plein Air event in May. Standing there on the sidewalk in the town plaza, I sketched fairly quickly – the morning light changes rapidly – and this is what I got;

The backlit set up and moving targets were chosen because they allowed me to simplify and abstract what I was seeing. That actually was main concern - I couldn't care less about the local colors or details - that was unimportant to me.

I was pretty happy with the sketch, and later on in the studio, I decided to do a different crop, at a slightly larger size:

All the action was at the street level, so I cut out the sky and the trees. The best part about the top half of the painting were the telephone poles and I hated to get rid of those for I thought they added to the small-town charm. I had to ask myself, "but is this painting about small town charm? I decided no, I was more interested in the activity that one might witness on a typical early morning. Sure enough, once I cut out the sky and the trees, the scene looked more like Brooklyn (where I used to live) than the sleepy town of Sonoma.

This was worth investigating and pushing further, as I intended this painting to be included in my solo show, which would be very urban in theme. I liked the painting well enough, but something bothered me about it and I couldn't figure out what it was for a long time. I decided to set it aside and let stew for while.

Weeks later, it hit me. It's too frick'n quaint! That little truck is just too cute. I don't want cute paintings.

Now that I started to fixate on the unpleasant cuteness of the truck, it started to seem to me like the painting was about the truck, and not about the morning activity / mood. It kinda looks like a spread out of a children's book about life in Brooklyn. Or something. Nothing wrong with that, if I were illustrating such a book, but I'm not. So the truck had to go. As I painted over it and tried different kinds of cars, I realized I could make this feel more urban by adding more visual noise - more cars and people.

I also noticed that the more "defined" the central car and other visual elements, the more narrative the painting seemed to become. That must mean that the more abstract they were, the less narrative it would become. Well I knew that already (I was an illustrator for 17 years so...) but was delighted to rediscover that notion in this painting. Like magic, the painting became more about the city bustle than the stupid cute truck that couldn't.

Much better.

Is That Enough?

2011-07-21T07:52:00.000-07:00

I was trying to organize my database I found I had a photo of the painting at an earlier stage. I thought it illustrated what I was talking about yesterday–in particular the notion of "how simple is enough?"- pretty clearly.

As you can see, at this stage I have the canvas already covered, and the structure of the painting is already in place. The paint is pretty thin still. The cars on the left are painted with fewer values, and with less detail. They look like cars, but is that enough? I decided no, they needed a little bit more information as they're in the foreground.

The tree mass in the middle left also got an extra value. It's still very simple – just a few strokes of light– but I think the volume created by it adds to the believability of the midground area without distracting from the good stuff.

This is a close-up of the figures. As you can see, they're just blobs. Barely recognizable silhouettes on their own, but plenty recognizable in context. I didn't think they needed any more detail than that. What gives them a little bit of a sense of complexity is the second, lighter value on the figure on the left. It doesn't define anything in particular, but it helps to tie the figures to the ground, and gives them a perceived sense of reflected light. Similarly, the cast shadow on the ground behind the figures to the left has a slightly lighter value laid on top, making that part of the shadow lighter than the corresponding part on the right of the figures. That lighter note represents the shadow being affected by ambient light of the sky. It's darker to the right because closer to the buildings the ambient light decreases.

That seems like a nitpicky detail for something so far in the distance, but the purpose of that is not to add more detail per se, but to add perception of complexity. Had I painted those shapes flat with a single color/value, they would just look like paper cut outs.

The variety of edges and textures (some reliant on canvas texture, some on paint thickness and application) does the same thing. Decisions for these are made not so much with "rules of realism" as with the intent to be expressive with the brush and to integrate one shape with another.

I think my work is getting more and more abstract. I'm happy about that.

How About Blue?

2011-07-19T11:03:00.000-07:00

Urban Blues, 12 x 24 inches, oil on linen

In back-lit situations, there are several characteristics that I really like, and I try to exploit these to my advantage. I mentioned them briefly in the previous post, but let's see if we can dig a little deeper. The most obvious of these is that you are looking at the shadow side of things. We might get a strong rim light, or at least a clear light-shadow pattern that describe the construct of the thing –a car, for example. And because we don't see any detail, we are forced to simplify the car into two simple values. One for light, and one for shadow. It's tempting to add more detail, but if we stop and take a look at the two-value car in the context of the painting, it may occur to us that it already looks like a car without any detail. If we defined the wheels or the fender, will it help make our statement more clearly? Or will it just
give us a more detailed car, and lessen the impact of our statement. Do we have a good reason for the car being more than merely identifiable as a car? Maybe the simplest depiction possible is enough? May be, May be not. It depends on the context.

And often, we get a silhouette and nothing else. If the silhouette has a strong identifiable shape say, a pedestrian walking, we don't even need a light-and-shadow pattern on the form itself for it to be identifiable. That's even simpler than a two-value construct, right? Because I'm trying to say more with less, this is an enormously handy device.

If you look at the painting at the top, you might say "but you're painting the cars with more than one or two values!" And that would be true, but only in the foreground. I do paint them all with one or two values at first. Then, I ask myself is that enough? Sometimes the answer is yes. Other times, especially when they are closer, I need a little more. I add a third value. Or a hint of a headlight or something. Each time, I ask, is that enough? More often than not, I don't know that it's enough till I've gone too far, and then I have to take stuff out. The goal is to say it with as few values and details and brushstrokes as possible. Obviously what is enough depends on what I'm trying to say with that element.

Another thing I love about back-lit views is the heavy atmospheric effect. The sun has to shine through all that "stuff" in the air, emphasizing the veil effect. It contributes to a sense of mystery, depth, and again, simplicity.

The color of the light through the atmosphere dominates everything else, so the local color becomes nearly irrelevant. What does that mean? That means I can choose whatever color I want as a theme, and not worry about all the disharmonious city colors fragmenting the picture. Yesterday's painting was done predominantly in yellow, and today's is done in blue. The choice is entirely subjective.

And when the color structure is tonal like that, I can use really dark colors without them looking out of place. I don't know why you can get away with really dark shadows in a tonal painting but not in more naturalistic palettes, but that's the way it is. May be it's just me. I dunno.

So a lot of advantages to painting back-lit. All contributing to simpler, moodier, more atmospheric statements. And that is right up my alley, don'tchaknow.

Before I close today's post, I thought I'd share a little fix on yesterday's post. After I saw the image on the blog, I noticed a design no-no. The two cars have angles that come together in a confusing tangent. I don't know why I didn't notice it before. Sometimes it takes shrinking the image to take in the whole, and only then I notice mistakes like that.

So I just moved the profile car down a little bit. Much better.

Something Clicked

2011-07-17T22:17:00.000-07:00

I think I'm on to something. According to my test (see previous post) if after a couple of paintings I get bored of my newfound voice, it's not really my voice. I was just bedazzled by a discovery which turned out to be something cosmetic. Not so profound as to finding myself.

Not that I think I can just find myself that easily. Nor do I think it'll take less than a lifetime. But I think I've found a piece of the puzzle. It feels like a corner piece, even. I applied the test, and not only did I not get bored after two or three paintings, but I just keep getting sucked into it further and further. I have now done over thirty paintings pursuing this path, and it feels like the paintings just paint themselves. I'm just holding onto the brush for dear life!

The ride is bumpy, to be sure, and of the thirty, many ended up in the trash but even those felt good to do. I can't clearly identify what "it" is that I found, but I can feel it in my bones.

You see, over the years and in the course of doing thousands of paintings, I began to notice certain patterns in my tendencies. The things I like and don't like. I became more aware of what I respond to, both in my own paintings and in other people's. And also in what I see out there in the course of a normal day. When I took stock of these likes and dislikes, it became more clear to me why I thought some good paintings failed, and why some others, while not so good, resonated with me.

Here are some of my likes:
- a sense of mystery.
- atmosphere.
- flat shapes.
- anonymity.
- moodiness.
- quiet.
- subtlety.
- obscurity.
- expressive, yet controlled brushwork.
- muted colors.
- close harmonies.
- ordinary things and views.
- evokative qualities.

And here are some things that I either don't like, or I like in other people's work but not in mine:
- slick realism.
- lots of detail.
- bright colors.
- compositions that rely on, or dominated by complex perspectives.
- sentimentalism.
- the spectacular in nature. Like fiery sunsets. or the Grand Canyon.
- anomalies in nature.
- too much narrative.
- portraiture.
- still life.
- "pretty" things.
- subjects that are more or less irrelevant to my daily life. Boats, for example.

The "dislikes" are a lot trickier to identify, because most of these things I actually do like when I see them done well by other people. Sometimes I might even love them so much that I start fooling myself into believing I would like them in my own paintings too.

There are more on the lists, and they become more specific to technique, or mood, or color, or what have you. The thing is, I've known my tendencies for a long time but I never listened to myself. I would see a beautiful painting done by a friend, and think, "wow! that is so freakin' cool! I want to do that!!" And I would allow myself to be influenced. That stuff doesn't stand my test, of course, but I would come out of it more confused than when I started.

So what happened? It wasn't a sudden epiphany or anything, but earlier this year, I had an occasion to paint some people crossing the street in front of cars. This was done en plein air, which means moving targets. Basically memory painting on the spot is what it was. Which is not something new for me. What was different this time, was the view I was painting was back-lit. When looking into the sun, everything becomes simplified because you really can't see any detail. The light and shadow separation is pretty much all you get. You might get some local colors in the foreground, but remember, my foreground elements were moving so I didn't get a chance to overwork them, neither in detail or color.

What I had before me was devoid of detail, very atmospheric, almost completely tonal. Which meant I had no bright colors. Very moody, and because I was painting moving targets, my brushwork was about movement, not about the pedestrians or cars. There's a huge difference between painting "things" like people, and painting visually abstract notions like "motion". I end up having pedestrians on my canvas but I wasn't painting them. I was painting "motion".

I realized that here was a subject matter and set up that forced me to emphasize all that I liked, and none that I disliked. Ping! Lightbulb!

I went home, and started to experiment in the studio, painting backlit cityscapes and comparing them to the same scenes painted front or side lit. And it became more and more clear that when I painted a back lit view, I would paint more abstractly (because I couldn't see anything literal beyond silhouettes), whereas front or side lit views would put my mind in a more literal gear.

OK, this is good, I thought. Lots of potential. Let's try a few more and see if there's more to it...

A Breakthrough!?

2011-07-14T10:49:00.000-07:00

Moving Silhouettes, 12 x 21 inches, oil on linen

As we keep practicing and getting better at this painting thing, we have little breakthroughs from time to time. In the beginning, it's all about technique – I remember when I had an a-ha! moment about color harmony, and another about paint viscosity. These little breakthroughs are what keeps us hooked. We learn new things, and the more we learn, the more obvious it becomes that there's so much we don't yet know. And yet, somehow we know that if we keep trying, we'll get there - where ever "there" is. If we didn't have that conviction what's the point in trying? I'm not happy just making one so-so painting after another. Are you?

But as you know, the climb ain't easy. The more technical knowledge you amass, the harder it becomes. The breakthroughs start happening much less frequently, and the plateaus become higher and farther apart. It's not uncommon to start thinking that we'll never get any better. We've peaked. This is as good as we'll get. The slump lasts longer, the despair darker. Sound familiar?

You know what I think? I think it's because– partially, anyway– as our technique improves, the breakthroughs become less about the technique and more about expression. Finding our voice. Coming to terms with our identity. Now that's pretty heavy stuff. I mean, anyone can paint a tree. How do you make it your tree? Am I talking about style? In a way, yes. but see, here's the problem. Consciously created style is, by definition, contrived. I know that's absolutely true in my case. In searching for my own voice, I've tried –and found– my "style" over and over again, only to realize each time, it was contrived and wasn't really my identity. Just another schtick, if you will.

I've come to recognize my tendency to get excited about some little discovery or another and convincing myself that this is it! this is my style! It's easy to delude yourself when that particular breakthrough happens in a successful painting. You know what I mean? But invariably, after two or three paintings in that "style", I get bored. The novelty is gone. It wasn't my style, after all. Depressing.

If I'm lucky, I will have gained some kernel of knowledge or a piece of the puzzle in my pursuit of my identity - or the recognition thereof. But it's all so fragmented and vague. It's not quantifiable. I can't even articulate it. It kinda sucks.

But the good news is, that I have a test for determining whether a new discovery is at least a part of my true identity or not. If I get bored of it after two paintings, then the answer is no. Accept the defeat, and move on. At least I know what I'm not. The process of elimination continues.

So for the past twenty years or more, I've been searching, discovering, testing, and always getting a negative result. It has never stuck.

That is, until now.

Blue (violet) and Red (orange)

2011-07-12T11:39:00.000-07:00

Between Blue and Red, 14 x 14, oil on linen

It's typical for me to assign myself a task, a goal, if you will, for a study based on a previous effort. During or after I do a painting, there are often questions like, "what if I made it this color, or if I made that part simpler?" If I keep most other things similar, the comparison between the new and the previous pieces can be very instructional, much more so than if I kept changing things on one canvas, in which case I only have my memory to compare against. I suppose I can take photos along the way, but it's still nice to set two variations physically side by side and scrutinize them together.

So for this particular painting, I wanted to use a very similar palette to the previous week's painting (last post) but push the saturation of the colors a little farther, blasting a color field in a non-focal area. I knew it would be a more graphic solution than strictly representational, and that's what I was going for.

Compared to the last week's painting, the new one obvious has more impact. It's much louder, is the impression I get. It is more appropriate for this particular model, but that's beside the point. (Because I'm not interested in portraying her likeness or personality)

I like the boldness, but I did lose that quiet, airy quality of the last piece. To be expected of course, you can't be both quiet and loud!

So for the next piece, I wanted to go back to a quieter, airy mood. I decided to use much less blue and push the whole thing toward red, and keep the overall values in the higher register (light and airy, remember?)

Sitting Pretty, 18 x 18, oil on linen

The model was sitting on the same sofa, but I made it more bed-like. She was young and pretty, which posed a challenge because the painting kept wanting to be about a pretty girl. I kept having to downplay the facial features because every time I added this detail or that, it accentuated her identity. I'm more interested in painting Everywoman, and not a specific girl. Easy to do when the painting is small and I can't put facial features in there if I wanted to, but this was a larger canvas (her head is about 4 inches on the canvas) and it's hard to leave empty a shape that size.

I'm happy with the overall mood, though. I think I can still go lighter and airier. Maybe if I keep pushing that I'll end up with a white Rothko painting!

Her hand needs a little work still. It looks unnatural, and carries too much intent, only that intent is unknown and isn't part of the concept. Its gesture is too loud and irrelevant. I'll have to try a few different positions and see what works.

Starting with the next post, I'll be sharing my NEW cityscapes. I'm really excited about this new direction, and I'm eager to have them see the light of day!

Stay tuned.

More on the Figure Sketch

2011-07-08T07:38:00.000-07:00

Upon seeing my last post, a couple of students asked me what I actually did on some of the stages, as they couldn't tell from the small video. Also, they wanted to know why I did what I did in certain stages because it didn't quite make sense to them. Admittedly my "messy method" is sometimes a little confusing to students who're looking for a clear, prescribed process because the sequence doesn't really go from point A to point B in a straight line. It strays and meanders, depending on how I'm responding to the problem at hand.

So in an effort to clarify my intentions at each stage, here's the step by step, with running commentary.

I started with a very general wash, trying to get the figure placed on the canvas. The figure is placed in such a way that I have more foreground than background because I really had nothing to say about the background and I liked the psychological distance between me and the model, provided by the near end of the sofa and its emptiness.

Here's my view of the model. Unless I'm doing a portrait, which is not often, I like set up farther back in the room so that 1) I'm not tempted by little teeny detail, 2) I get less of a fish-eye distortion because at a distance I don't have to move my head up and down to see the whole figure.

On top of the wash, I started drawing with a small brush. Sometimes I draw first then put the wash in. Other times, I wash in first. I generally wash-then-draw when I want the painting to be looser.

Here I'm pushing the darks to separate light from shadow. The colors look pretty red (brown) but that wasn't intentional. I use a mix of Transparent Red Oxide, Ultramarine, and solvent, and I just happened to have more red oxide in the mix. Had I gone more blue, it would have been fine, too.

With a lighter, opaque (has white in the mix) color, I roughly blocked in the lights. It's sort of pinkish, because at this point (actually, from the get-go) I'd already had in my mind to do this painting in a blue-violet atmospheric tonalist sort of structure. And the pink is just that violet pushed toward warm, toward red-violet. Warm light, cool shadow.

Blocked in the shadow areas, roughly, in dark violet. Just the couch, head (hair) and the dress - I wanted to separate the skin from the darker fabrics.

The shadow side of the skin is blocked in (see arm) with a lighter violet. Now the pink I used a few stages back makes more sense, no?

Defining the sofa by cleaning up the shape of the lights on it. Doesn't take much, does it.

Background is blocked in with what I thought was a very light blue violet. Obviously it wasn't very light, so I'll be lightening that later, but now I have a better sense of the color context.

The figure gets better definition. Keepin' it all simple. Careful to define the front plane of the head with shape, plus the nose is indicated. I don't need any more information in the face than that.

Now I'm pushing the lights further. I also brought the background violet down into the couch behind the figure, and also into the figure itself near the head and shoulder area.

Lightened the background a little bit, plus the far end of the sofa got some reflected light pulled into it. I decided to shorten her legs a little bit because the horizontal lines in that area seemed to have too much impact.

Added the orange of the scarf as a color accent. I wasn't sure if I needed a color accent, but decided to try and see if it worked - how else will I know, right? It seemed to work OK.

Encouraged by the orange color note, I pushed the blue violets in the shadows, and lightened the background even more. In the background, I mixed in a small bit of cool yellow to give the painting a more of a hue range. It still feels tonal, but not as monochromatic. Small refinements on shapes and edges, like the light on her left knee. The angle of the bottom edge is changed to reflect the top leg casting a shadow across the bottom, so that the left leg tucks under better.

I debated whether to paint the shadow side of the legs but decided against it, leaving the transparent brushstrokes as they were. The variety of surfaces it provided seemed to trump a nice opaque reflected light in that area. Probably would have worked either way, but that's one place where I can't "do it just to see what it looks like" because once you go opaque, you can't really go back to that fresh transparent stroke-y look.

That's it. I liked the color scheme very much, and I wondered how it would look if I pushed the saturation further in certain areas. So I did another painting with that in mind, (different session, different model) and I will post that one next so you can see the difference.

A Figure Sketch

2011-07-02T11:07:00.000-07:00

click on the image to see the video a little bit larger.

During the figure session yesterday, I remembered (wow!) to take snapshots of the work in progress. I thought it would be neat to put it all together in a little slide show. It certainly does open my eyes when I see the sequence after the fact.

I haven't edited video in years, and it turns out the current version of iMovie is nothing like what I was using three years ago, and I couldn't make heads or tails out of it. My teenage son is the expert now, but being a teenager, he's got no time!

So I resorted to doing the dumbed down version in iPhoto, which is still pretty cool given the fact that my knowledge of technology is quickly becoming obsolete.

Anyway, a little bit about the painting; the sketch is done on a piece of linen taped to a board, and it's about 12 x 14 or thereabouts.

The painting took probably 1.5hrs or 2hrs at most, including the time I took to do thumbnails.

The photos were taken with my iPhone under classroom lighting conditions, which is my way of saying cut me some slack on the quality of the photos!

The method you see in this clip is what I call my "messy method", where I go in with very vague, abstract, loose washes and try to find shapes in them, gradually tightening up as I go. This is in contrast to my "orderly method", where I do a more careful drawing first.

I tend to go with the "messy method" when I want to focus on the abstract things like gesture, atmosphere, and mood. I use the "orderly method" when specific types of information has more importance. For example, the likeness of the model for a portrait treatment, or if I were painting a landscape feature that needs to be recognizable, or an identifiable architecture or a car model.

This painting was not about the identity of the model, so a tight drawing in the beginning wasn't necessary. I was more interested in the gesture and abstraction, so the "messy method" suited me well.

I hope you enjoy the little slide show!

Not Just Limited Palette

2011-06-28T10:35:00.000-07:00

I'm limiting more than just my palette, which is already limited. Striving for fewer, more meaningful brushstrokes, and limiting description of superfluous detail, I continue to pursue simplicity and abstraction.

I'm particularly happy with this little sketch, which is about 8 x 16 or thereabouts. Here are some rules I gave myself in my attempt to get at the essence of what this painting is about.

- One hue per visual element.

- Two values per visual element. (light and shadow)

- Paint no wrinkles in the fabric. only big folds.

- Lose an edge on every shape.

- Identifiability dictates the number of stokes. If, after one stroke, I can tell what it is I just painted, stop. No need to put down a second stroke. Unless the first stroke is in the wrong place or wrong shape – then re-do the first stroke, rather than add to the first stroke.

- Gesture is the primary concept for this painting. Every stroke should be about gesture. Suggesting patterns on the shirt, for example, has nothing to do with the gesture, so I didn't paint it. Same for pockets and stitching on the jeans, bracelets and ear rings, even facial features did not contribute to defining the gesture, so none of those things were painted. Minimal amount of definition in the face was suggested by painting the light and shadow pattern, because it was necessary to suggest how the head/face was oriented - that's part of the gesture.

- Reassess frequently. "Does that stroke help to describe the gesture? or does it say something else, like the fabric-ness of the fabric?" Stick to the concept.

- Deviate from the above rules only as far as necessary to pull together a painting as a whole. (the near arm has more than one hue and more than two values, for example)

I stuck to my rules for the most part. The temptation to just paint what I saw in front of me was really great and it took considerable effort and some back tracking to stay on course. But that's always the case when we are pushing ourselves do a little better.

Giving yourself simple, specific rules like these is a very effective way to practice your craft. Write them down before you start and tape that piece of paper onto your easel. At the end of the session, see if you have followed your own rules. If the painting doesn't look so great but you followed your rules, give yourselves an A. If you deviated from your rules because you forgot or was tempted by your ingrained habits, you get an F. Too harsh? Not really, it's just a question of whether you stuck to your own rules or not. If you got an F, just try again. And again, till you get an A. And then do it again.

If it makes you feel any better, I've given myself thousands of F's. :-)

Crocker Museum Auction 2011

2011-06-23T09:41:00.001-07:00

Bygone Days, 32 x 14, oil on linen sold

This painting was my entry for the annual Crocker Museum Art Auction this year. I wasn't able to attend any of the festivities because I was in Sonoma, but I'd heard that the event was a great success and my painting fetched a respectable price. Whew~ I was a little vexed after last year's auction so I didn't get my hopes up, but it all turned out well. Perhaps the economy is slowly turning around.

The painting, obviously, is very tonalist. The colors are very much influenced by the Early California tonalists, as is the subject matter (the Eucalyptus). Beyond the obvious, what I really wanted to do was to pay close attention to the application of paint. Specifically, taking full advantage of the canvas texture to create broken, yet distinctive, edges in the focal area. Here the softness is a result of dragging the paint across the tops of the texture, much like drybrushing. Only with a loaded brush–I don't know if that's still considered drybrushing but I tend to think they're different. Shaping the foliage does take considerable back and forth between the tree and the sky, so it's not a one shot deal like (what I think of as) a drybrush stroke. The key is in starting very thin and transparent, and get thicker as I finalize the shape. My aim was to have an overall soft feel to the contour, but each stroke's broken edges be crisp. In other words, no blending.

By having even softer, some blended edges toward the bottom–together with very close values which also contributes to a softness– the focal area becomes even more emphasized.

There are so many ways to create a soft edge. Sometimes I feel like that's where the true identity of the artist is found... more so than color choices or subject matter. Then again, I'll probably change my mind about that tomorrow.

Changing Seasons

2011-06-21T13:42:00.000-07:00

A high of 100F this afternoon! I guess summer is finally here?

This is a small painting that I started as a demo for my Landscape Concepts class. I later put a few more hours into it.

Here in the inland Northern California, we don't get big thunderheads during summer. But I spent my formative years in a more humid climate, so I always associate thunderheads with summertime. Seasonal "cues" are a big part of what makes landscape painting so compelling, and I find it almost an imperative to include some sort of visual element that lets the viewer know the time of the year.

I know where it comes from. It comes from growing up in Japan where traditional literature always includes seasonal cues. Take haiku for example. You've got only seventeen syllables to make your statement, and it must always include a "ki-go", which literally means "seasonal word". If it doesn't include a ki-go, it's not a haiku. It's a different format called senryu. (Still the same 5-7-5 syllables)

I see landscape painting similarly, but the problem with painting in California is that the seasonal cues which point to a specific time of the year elsewhere, don't necessarily apply here. In Japan, hydrangea means June. Morning glory is July, sunflower is August, cosmos is september. Here, all these flowers can bloom from spring to fall, so they don't really serve the purpose of ki-go with the same specificity.

Not that I'm really looking to be that specific and literal, but I do respond to moods and memories of a specific time more than place. So I do like the idea of weaving in seasonal cues in my paintings, if only as a peripheral player.

I'm not talking about hit-your-viewer-over-the-head type of seasonal depiction, like a snowstorm. Often the quality of light itself is enough to point to a certain season. Or the colors of the foliage (green grass in California means Winter!) If I look at a painting and think that it could be any time of the year, it doesn't really resonate with me. It doesn't stir anything in my memory.

On the other hand, if a landscape painting does grab my attention and holds me there, it usually has a strong sense of seasonal mood to it.

If you're interested in the influence of Japanese literature, especially pertaining to sensitivity to seasons, check out My Neighbor Totoro, a masterpiece animated film by Hayao Miyazaki. And pay close attention to the background paintings. In practically every scene, there are very specific and accurate seasonal visual cues. Sometimes they're plants, other times they're certain kinds of insects. They might be obvious or subtle, but they are used extremely thoughtfully and effectively to provide a timeline for the story.

And big thunderheads? August.

Painting in Amador

2011-06-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, I led fourteen students up the hill to the beautiful Amador Wine Country to do a plein air workshop. Here we are at Deaver's Winery during my demo.

We lucked out with absolutely perfect weather! Even though I was standing in the sun, it didn't bother me a bit.

Start of my demo.

Halfway through.

Finished demo.

We painted all day Saturday and Sunday, and everyone made great progress, I think. Perfect weather, beautiful location, great bunch of people, some good eats and of course nice wine at the end of the day made for a very enjoyable weekend.

If you missed out on this workshop, I hope you can join us next time!!

Haha~

2011-06-14T18:54:00.000-07:00

This cracks me up. My work was commercial (illustration) and I still had to wait tables! Hahaha~

Field to Studio

2011-06-08T09:20:00.000-07:00

Here's a shot at what's on my easel in the studio. To the left, resting against my computer monitor is one of the paintings I did during the Sonoma Plein Air event. I am using it as a starting point to work up a larger (12 x 24) piece in the studio.

The new painting is on loose canvas (Claessens No.66) taped to a board - if the painting turns out satisfactory, I will mount it on panel. If not, into the garbage bin it goes with the rest of the losers.

In doing a larger studio version, there were a few things I wanted to try. First was cropping. I eliminated the top third (?) of the painting, as my concept had nothing to do with the sky and the trees, and excluding them made for a stronger, more focused statement. Simplifying your statement is often the best thing you can do to improve a picture, and that's the case here.

Secondly, I wanted a more tonal structure. Especially because it's essentially a backlit view, the structure is revealed by the light and dark patterns, not local colors or rendered forms. We recognize most of the visual elements in this picture due to their shapes. Silhouettes are particularly good tools to exploit, because if you can recognize the "thing" by its silhouette, any more information (color, for example) isn't going to make it more recognizable. So the additional elements - color, value variations within the shape - have to contribute something other than recognizability, or their just pointless fluff. In my case, the color is used as accents to make the painting appear not too tonal. If you hide the colors in the foreground elements, you'll see that the painting is pretty much monochromatic.

Manipulating values within a recognizable shape helps to make them not look too flat and cut out, adds to a sense of atmosphere and movement, which in turn contributes to abstraction.

I think it's coming along pretty well, but now I have to let it rest for a while so I can come back to it with a fresh eye. In the meantime, I'll be working on some other paintings, exploring the same issues to see if I can't come up with more studio pieces for my solo show in the fall. (info to come)

Sonoma Plein Air Saturday Pics

2011-06-02T09:51:00.000-07:00

Here are some shots from the show and sale on Saturday. Thanks for letting me use these pics, Janice and Kim!!

Sonoma Plein Air - Day 6

2011-05-30T08:46:00.000-07:00

I got no pics from this day, so here are a few more sketches I did during the week~

Saturday. This is the big show and sale day at the Town Plaza. The weather looked perfectly sunny, calm, and pleasant. I headed down to the plaza, had my cup of coffee and of course my custard danish, then proceeded to set up. The other artists were all arriving and the place was abuzz with activity. I could see some great paintings hanging up around me.

When we officially "opened" at 10am, some of the serious collectors were already picking out their favorites. Early bird gets the best painting, as they say.

The show looked great, and I sold three paintings, (including the one that didn't go last night) which is better than I did last year. My paintings are priced a bit higher than the average and they tend to be more muted and quiet, which are some of the reasons why I don't sell as many as some of the others. I also don't paint too many "identifiably Sonoma" views either, which turns away collectors who want quintessential Sonoma views. But that's just the way it is. I'm not going to change the way I paint, and I can't lower my prices. But I know there are collectors who love and appreciate what I do, so it's just a matter of connecting with them. I feel pretty good about my four (three today + the Quickdraw) connections.

The weather turned wet in the afternoon so we had to cut out early, which was a bummer but there's nothing we could do about that. I heard they may move the event back to fall next year to take advantage of the more predictable weather. That'd be a good idea.

A bunch of us ended up at the bar on the plaza, and had one last drink and a little post-event pow-wow. All in all I had a great week of painting and hanging out with my tribe. Happy to have made new friends, too.

I'm sorry I don't have any photos from this day, but if anyone reading this have any shots (don't have to be of me or my work - just snaps of the event would be good) please send me some so I can put them up on this post.

Sonoma Plein Air - Day 5

2011-05-30T08:45:00.000-07:00

The Back Way, 11 x 14

Friday. This is the last day of painting, and also the day of the gala event. Typically I would do one or two small no-pressure paintings in the morning, and spend the afternoon touching up, signing, photographing, and framing the week's effort.

However when I peeked out the window this morning I saw that it was drizzling. Not that I can't paint in the rain, but I kinda had my mind set on doing no-pressure paintings. Taking it easy, that is. So I just decided to brew myself a cup of strong coffee and started on the afternoon's work of busystuffs first. May be by afternoon it'll clear up and I can squeeze in a painting before the big gala.

I had ten paintings to photograph and frame, which takes a while. A few of them needed some last minute fixes (usually there's a few that need help) so I spent the entire morning on doing that. From experience, I knew all this took about three hours. Even at a very leisurely pace, I was done by noon, and I saw that by then the rain had let up and the sun was shining.

I didn't need to be at the gala till 4:30, so plenty of time to go out and paint. As is my habit, I had already staked out spots for my Friday no-pressure paintings, so I didn't have to waste my time looking for a spot. I went there directly, set up, and painted this one with a cup of coffee in my left hand.

I was very happy with it, and decided this one will be my gift to my wonderful hosts.

The big gala event is held again this year at the Cline Cellars barrel room, transformed into a fancy white-tablecloth venue. Everyone arrived dressed up and with their best piece of the week. What a great show! There were some really nice pieces that I would love to have taken home with me.

Keith Wicks won best of show with his stunning painting of the facade of the old hotel on the town square. I thought that was the right piece to win. Bryan Taylor and Michelle Usibelli got Honorable Mentions. Congrats you guys!!

After a great dinner, (lots of wine, good conversation, and tons of money raised for the art programs of Sonoma County schools) we said good night, and went home to rest up for the Saturday's big show and sale. My gala piece didn't sell at the silent auction, but I was pretty sure it'll go the next day so I wasn't particularly worried. I found out the next day, though, that some of the patrons wanted to buy it but thought it was already taken, apparently, because I had put down the price in the wrong spot of the bid sheet? Huh. I wonder how many times that's happened without my realizing. Or to other artists? Something to bring to the organizers' attention, may be.

One more day to go!

Sonoma Plein Air - Day 4

2011-05-30T08:41:00.000-07:00

Sonoma Morning, 9 x 12

Thursday. I didn't sleep in this morning! Up at six, out the door by six thirty. It took a few days to get into fifth gear, I guess.

On my way into town, I stopped on the side of the road to do this painting. I wasn't planning to do this - the view just caught my eye and I said, why not? Trees are much easier than buildings and cars, that's for sure. I was done in about an hour, and I went on to get my coffee.

Juiced up with caffeine, I was ready to tackle something more challenging. I saw an old VW Bug parked on one of the side streets the other day and I noticed that it stayed there the whole day. Which means if I saw it at the same spot today, it probably will stay there. I went looking for it, and there it was, waiting to be painted.

Idlebug, 11 x 14

I walked around, viewed it from all possible angles (where I'd be able to set up my easel) and decided on - surprise! - backlit. However, the surroundings weren't all that interesting, so I decided to move the vehicle in my composition. So I first worked out the drawing of the car (without nailing the car, nothing I do around it will make the painting) and then moved the easel a few yards to paint the environment so that the car looked like it was stopped at an intersection, with a pedestrian crossing the street right in front of it.

Pleased with the result, I packed up and went to another one of those fabulous lunch events, where caught up with everyone and heard about their painting adventures.

Crossing Over, 12 x 16

In the afternoon, I did another, more ambitious version of my Quickdraw. This time, I included more of the background buildings, and gave it a little more color. Also, I did it larger (12 x 16). It turned out to be quite a challenge not only because buildings in perspective are a pain in the ass, but the wind was howling in my face the entire time, and on top of that, I had an audience of a handful of spectators behind me the entire two and a half hours! To be sure, they weren't heckling me or anything, (that is to say, they weren't my friends) but I was aware of being watched the whole time and felt I couldn't do a crappy job. May be that helped? I thought the painting was pretty good. A little different color scheme than my normal comfort zone, but I think it's OK.

Later in the evening, my hosts threw a very fab dinner party. Great food, great wine, (my hosts are winery owners) and great people. This is the life, man~

I'm in bed typing this at 10pm. I do plan on getting up early and painting tomorrow morning. In the afternoon I'll be busy touching up, photographing, and framing, so I just have time for one - may be two paintings before the big gala event. Better get some sleep now. I'm exhausted!

Sonoma Plein Air - Day 3

2011-05-30T08:31:00.000-07:00

Gray Day On The Marshes, 11 x 14

When I awoke, it was alreay 8 O'clock. WTF!? I must have been really tired. I showered and got dressed quickly, and ran out the door, only to find out it was raining! Damnit.

I can paint in rain, but I'd rather not. I wanted to do more back-lit town things, so this changes my plans. First thing's first. I got my custard danish and coffee.

It was windy, too. And chilly. I headed out toward the marshes to maybe do a gray marshy painting. I've actually done many marsh paintings on gray moody days, so it wasn't a matter of whether I could do it or not.

But it wasn't what I planned for so my enthusiasm was less than optimal, and consequently, I struggled. I used the hatchback of my SUV as rain shelter, and bundled up to keep out the cold (still, my fingers were frozen!) and managed to finish a painting. I'm not sure if I like it. I think I'll have to do more work on it before I can show it.

The pic I'm posting is the "before" version. I added more subtle lights in the clouds, and worked on the foreground color a bit. I forgot to take the "after" picture, though. And the painting is sold so now it's too late. Sorry.

An American Eatery, 12 x 16

In the afternoon, the rain let up and the sun came back. I thought now would be the time to go back to the Fremont Diner to paint the old truck there. I did this location last year, and I've subsequently painted it a few more times from photos. This year, I wanted to try it back lit. The sun was still very high up, but it looked back lit enough, so I set up and got to work. I also wanted to be less literal with the colors, but that proved to be very difficult with this particular truck, whose colors (rusty red and peeling off pale green paint) are one of the its defining characteristics. I did what I could, and I'm pretty happy with it. I allowed myself to edit a lot more in the background this time, too. This is when I realized that I am making progress with my craft, though most of the time I feel like I'm stuck and not getting better. It's good to return to same motifs from time to time so you can plainly see your progress. I highly recommend it.

If I don't do anything better this week, this one will be the one to go to the gala auction to be judged by my peers. Having the auction piece done, I felt I could relax and go do something easier, or experimental, or whatever.

45, 9 x 12

I still had hours of daylight left so I went to a side road and did one of my road themed paintings. Again, back lit. I'm in this back lit kick, can you tell? I don't have a whole lot of cast shadows in this one so it's not a whole lot different from my usual front or side lit landscapes, but that's fine. I tried not to overdo the atmosphere, and it came out just as I imagined.

Beer after the workin' day's done with buddies. And then off to bed early so I won't be getting up at 8 O'clock in the morning. Except I might, because I'm typing this before going to bed and it looks like I'm not really going to be going to bed early. Haha~

Sonoma Plein Air - Day 2

2011-05-30T08:18:00.000-07:00

Early Delivery, 11 x 14

During the event, I stayed with a host family arranged by Sonoma Plein Air. The generosity and hospitality of the patrons who open up their homes for us artists is incredible. It reminds me that, despite all the crap going on in the world these days, there are lots and lots very nice people!

The house I'm staying at is located at the top of a mountain, and is nothing short of spectacular. The kind of house you'd expect to see on the cover of a magazine - complete with a view of the entire valley and beyond, a pool, and a bocce ball court. I am staying in the pool house, which is a fully furnished apartment unto itself. It's so comfortable that I don't feel like leaving it to go to work.

But go to work I must, so I got up around 6am and headed toward town. Before I get painting, I must stop at the Basque Cafe and have one of their custard danishes. I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but they have the best custard in the world! It's one of the reasons why I look forward to this event every year :-)

My friend Darrell Hill was having his breakfast at the Basque, so I joined him and took my time savoring my danish and coffee. I was procrastinating, to be honest, because I didn't have a plan of attack for the day.

When I find myself in that situation, I generally set up my easel where my car's parked, and just paint what's in front of me - I give myself the challenge of making something interesting out of an ordinary, sometimes dreadfully boring, scene.

My view.

Thumbs

Well this wasn't all that boring, but still a challenge. I was looking right into the sun so after a while my eyes hurt, and I had a hard time judging values - not to mention color. And as expected at this hour, the light changed very quickly. Still, I was able to finish the painting in a few hours and it didn't look too bad.

There was a lunch gathering planned for the artists but I still had over an hour till then. Not enough time to do another painting, so I sat around and drew in my sketchbook, thinking about what I might do that afternoon. Drawing always helps me focus, and in by lunch time, I had some ideas I wanted to try.

Lunch was awesome - Chef Terri Wicks never disappoints, and hanging out with friends over a good meal is always fun. We caught up on what everyone was doing – some had a sluggish time getting into the groove, while others were crankin' 'em out. I wasn't in the crankin' camp, but hey, it's still Day 2.

Andante, 9 x 12

After lunch, I went back to the town square and parked right on the busy street, and set up my easel in the street, protected by my parked vehicle. I set up my easel facing the sun, and proceeded to paint cars and people - all moving targets. This was the idea I wanted to try. Since endless supply of cars come and go, all stopping at the same spot, I figured it wouldn't be too difficult to just make a composite of sorts. And pedestrians were plentiful, too. Walking people are sort of my schtick, you know. So this was well within my comfort zone. But composite cars + walking people + backlighting... now this was something I haven't tried en plein air, so I was excited to give it a go, and was very pleased that it came out really nicely.

So pleased was I, that I decided to try it again for the Quickdraw event which was to take place later that afternoon. Knowing ahead of the time that I could pull this off in the limited time allotted gave me a peace of mind. I did anticipate that the sun was going to be much lower, so it would pretty much be in my eyes. But see, I did that this morning, so I was ready for the glare and all.

My view.

This is my quickdraw. To Get To The Other Side, 9 x 12.

As you can see, small changes, but very similar, overall. I felt I had a better understanding of the structure of this type of setup so I finished it in about an hour, satisfied. I think I will try this again, a little bigger next time. There are a couple of hue variations and local-color manipulations that I'd like to try, so I hope I get the chance to do it in the next coupla days.

My Quickdraw painting sold right away, for which I was very happy. That means I won't be skunked out. It's kind of a relief.

Later a bunch of us went to dinner and had a few beers, comparing notes and talking shop. I went back to the house exhausted and went right to sleep.

Sonoma Plein Air Day 1

2011-05-30T07:45:00.000-07:00

Almost Summer, 12 x 9

It has been a very busy few days! I am here in Sonoma, participating in Sonoma Plein Air Festival. As usual for these kinds of events, I will try and give you the blow by blow when possible.

This is my third or fourth time doing this event, and I always enjoy it. It's always fun painting in a beautiful place like Sonoma, and I really like hanging out with these artist friends whom I only see once or twice a year (usually at these events)

I don't live too far from Sonoma, actually– only an hour and a half or two hours drive from where I live. Today was the first day and we needed to check-in first, getting all our blank panels stamped on the back before doing any painting. (This is to prove that the paintings are done here this week, and not brought from home because that would be cheating. It's hard to believe that that would even be an issue. I mean, if you're not going to be painting en plein air during the festival, why would you even want to participate in this kind of event? )

I was in Madison, WI all weekend for National Science Olympiad (my son's team was representing Northern California - they did awesome!!) and I'd just got back on Sunday. I was so wiped out that I didn't get started on packing for the week-long festival till I got up this morning. Consequently, I was one of the last ones to arrive for the check-in.

Bryan Mark Taylor was just outside the building already nearly done with his first painting - I said hello and told him his colors were all wrong. No not really. His painting was looking pretty nice as usual, which made me a little anxious to get working myself.

Inside, Tim Horn was just checking in, and it looked like I was the very last one - I wasn't late, (check-in was 9am - noon and I got there with three minutes to spare) but I was told most everyone came early. Makes me look like a slug!

No matter. I like to pace myself anyway. No point in going full speed from the get go and burning myself out.

So I took my time and got myself a cup of joe, walked around the plaza and decided I would stay in town and do a town painting rather than go out in the field to paint eucalyptus trees or somethin'. I'm sort of in a town mode right now, what with getting ready for my fall show and all.

Here's the view...

...and my thumbs.

I parked my car, set up my easel under my hatchback, and proceeded to do a 9 x 12 of the little church just off the town square. I told myself it's just a warm up. Don't get uptight. Get the bad one out of my system. (This usually works for me) I was surprised to come away with a pretty decent piece.

Satisfied, I took a short break and planned my next painting. I moved my car half a block, and painted a facade of a building. I wasn't really interested in painting facades per se. I wanted to paint a pedestrian, fully lit, with a dark background. So I thought the deep shadow of this building would work pretty well. The geometric shapes was interesting, but may have been too strong- I did a some liberal editing and moving things around, and it started to not resemble the actual building. I don't particularly care about likenesses, but I kind of wanted to maintain the character of the place so I did end up reversing my edits a bit.

Beauty and the Beast, 12 x 9

Later we all gathered at the reception and said hello to old friends and met some new ones, had some wine and had a good time.

Now I must get some sleep! Tomorrow I should be painting in high gear!

Off With Her Head!

2011-05-16T06:26:00.000-07:00

Red Sofa No.2, 10 x 24 (?), oil on linen

Here's an example of what not to do. See the top of the sofa intersecting the figure right at the neck, separating the head from the body? (And the sofa is blood red! Yikes!) When you encounter an awkward alignment like this, just move the line up or down a little.

Theoretically, one could pull off a composition with odd tangents by manipulating edges and contrasts and what not, but sometimes it's just easier and more effective to simply move the offending element.

Otherwise I like this little sketch. I was especially happy with the brushwork. Too bad suggestion of decapitations don't quite fit into my repertoire.

All My Trade Secrets! And Some Nice Wines, Too.

2011-05-12T07:17:00.000-07:00

A few spots just opened up in my plein air painting workshop next month! We are going back to the beautiful Amador Wine Country in the gold country in the foothills (east of Sacramento).

The workshop takes place June 10-11-12, and we will be painting at a couple of really nice wineries. There will be demos and plenty of one-on-one instruction, and we will cover the entire process from thumbs to finish, and along the way, I'll share with you everything I know about plein air painting!

The cost is $325, and the workshop includes my newly-updated, 80 page, full color, fully illustrated, packed with information, super secret workshop book, which is only available to workshop participants.

Oh, and I'll buy the wine even~

So if you'd like to join me in painting Amador county, give the School of Light and Color a call - (916) 966-7517 and sign up! It will fill up (always does), so don't wait!!

Adjusting Your Key

2011-05-08T21:25:00.000-07:00

These two heads were painted during one session. The model didn't move, I did. I just wanted to do some quick studies rather than do a single, more involved painting.

When you take a photograph with a point-and-shoot camera, typically the camera automatically adjusts the exposure based on what it's focused on. (Yes, I'm aware that you can change settings on my camera to do otherwise) Given a view, if you focus on something in shadow, the camera will make sure that you can see detail in that area by adjusting exposure so that it's light enough. Which results in the lit areas becoming very light, often being washed out. (Because it has to be so much lighter than the shadows).

Conversely, if you focus on something brightly lit, camera adjusts the exposure in such a way that detail is clearly visible and colors very rich in the light area, but the shadows become really dark, sometimes obscuring everything.

Although our eyes are much much more sensitive than the camera and can see a lot more subtler shifts in color and value, they essentially do the same thing. If we're painting the brightly-lit model's head from the lit side, the shadows look pretty dark. On the other hand, if we move the easel so that we are looking into the shadow side, the lights look almost washed out. The lighting didn't change. Our eyes just adjusted.

It helps to be aware that our eyes do this, so that when we're painting, we can use this phenomenon to help organize our structure. In practical terms, here's what I do. If the focal point (or center of interest, if you like) is in light, or if I'm looking at the model from the lit side, I "key down" so that the general value range of the light side falls toward mid range, where colors can be more saturated and richer. Shadow side will necessarily become darker, and I try keep the shadow side very simple. Just a couple of values to define the planes.

If, on the other hand, my center of interest is in shadow, or I'm looking at the model from the shadow side, I "key up". I paint the shadow side near the middle value range, so that I can show more color and definition. If you paint the shadows really dark, you really don't see much color there because you're saying that there's not much reflected or ambient light to illuminate that area. You can't see much of anything in the dark. So if you "key up" the shadow side, what happens to the light side? it becomes lighter still, and become simplified in the higher value range. Almost washed out, depending on how strong the light is and how high you go up in key. Back lit situations are often treated this way.

So the next time you're painting a directly lit head (or figure or teapot or whatever), don't get stuck thinking there's one correct value for that shadow side. Instead, try starting the thinking process by defining in which side –light or shadow–your focal point will reside, and key up or down accordingly, simplifying the other side.

Playing With Acid

2011-05-03T09:00:00.000-07:00

Green Scarf, 12 x 9 inches, oil on linen

....Acid Green, that is.

Actually, I'm not sure what acid green looks like. It's probably more yellow than this. But all the same, it's a pretty intense, artificial looking green that I'm not sure I've ever used before. It works here though.

The model was clad all in the same bright green. I chose to dull down the blouse because I thought it was way too much otherwise.

The green scarf was painted toward the very end, after I worked on the head for about two hours. The face was looking pretty pale and colorless, but I knew that the scarf would provide the exclamation point that I needed in the end, so I didn't worry. The slight pink hues in the flesh tones, I guessed, would look redder when surrounded by all that green, and I was happy to see that my aim was on target.

A couple of other color strategies to note here: The background is also green, and this is not representational of what was actually behind the model. I made it green so it would be tonal and thus harmonious with the punch greens of the fabric. Also, the grayed down green of the fabric is a mix of the bright green of the scarf, plus the pinks and the reds I used in the flesh. By using colors that I've already established in the painting, the harmony is achieved more easily and predictably.

All in all, I like it very much.

Votive

2011-04-26T11:23:00.000-07:00

Votive, 16 x 12 inches, oil on linen