vitaminCreativity

Clearing again

There comes a time for all of us, I'm sure, when we must put away our toys and clean up our mess before starting the next game. That's where I am in my creative process this weekend. I'm wrapping up two classes - one oils, the other acrylics - and I have two different painting "kits" filled with all the various supplies that go with me to classes. Time now to unpack, clean up, review my inventory, and prepare for the next project.

I used to look at this as a waste of creative time, but now I'm seeing it as part of the creative process. It's an opportunity to think creatively about reorganizing my space; about re-using some leftover materials; and about that wonderful space (literally and psychologically) that is ready to be filled with something wonderful.

It's also a good time to review the business plan, including attention to framing and preparing for fall exhibits. 

If you have any clearing rituals between projects, I'd love to hear about them.

Cemetery Painting - the last chapter

I was back in the cemetery at 8:30 this morning, setting up my paints in the same spot I found on Tuesday. This time I took a few minutes to explore those mysterious grave makers and discovered that each one has a raised name and Mason's emblem. No dates. And each name is different, so it doesn't appear to be a family. The mystery deepens.

The painting was tricky to work on because instead of Liquin, I had used walnut oil, which doesn't dry as quickly. So I was painting wet into wet, trying to add a bit of definition in some areas and some bolder brush strokes in other areas.

It was a big day for visitors - two grave diggers in an adjacent area; a sweet lady taking a walk; a young deer; numerous spiders; a dragonfly and other flying things. Nevertheless, I felt alone, serene, and totally absorbed in my painting.

This was the last painting session for my plein air class; on Tuesday, we'll meet indoors for a final critique. But I plan to continue the plein air work, along with the studio improvisations of similar scenes.

In the Daily Art album, I'm posting "Cemetery Row," as well as one of my studio improvisations of a plein air painting I posted before.

Meditation in landscape

On Tuesday I went back to the cemetery to paint. I drove around for a while looking for a "good" spot. I found myself thinking about what constitutes "good" for me. I'm not drawn to the biggest, fanciest grave markers, whether they be stones or statues. Nor am I drawn to the sometimes symmetrical rows of stones. It seems I'm drawn by the unusual, the ironies, the implied stories, which will remain mysteries unless I also take the time to go to the cemetery office to do some research.

So as I drove around, I was attracted once again to the dead trees in this place of the dead; the duck family, squirrels, deer and birds (the full-time living visitors among the dead); and, finally, the odd row of almost two dimensional markers made of rusting metal, marching down a slope toward a huge tree. Since I'd already painted a dead tree, and I couldn't count on the living creatures to sit still for me, I opted for my mysterious row of markers.

As I had planned, I took about five minutes to feel the place: the cool shade of my vantage point, the near silence, the way the morning sun turned the rusted metal markers near white, the long shadows on the grass, the birds that liked to perch on the decorative balls atop the markers. I wondered about the stories these markers, now devoid of writing, might tell. A family site? A poor or miserly patriarch who couldn't or wouldn't afford stone or marble? Deceased related in time or cause of death as well as family ties? Is no one left on earth to care for or about these humble markers except an artist who happens to feel attracted to their simplicity, irregularity, and mystery?

I sketched, executed a very rough acrylic value painting, and took it back to my studio where, last night, I painted the first layer of oil. Tomorrow I'll return to my family of mysterious markers and, hopefully, complete the piece. Stay tuned.

As for the experimental meditation, I believe it definitely helped me make that connection to sense of place. We'll see if/how it affects the painting.

Connecting with the spirit of the land

If you're a landscape painter, presumably you have a love of the land, a passion for the way light and form makes shadows, a fascination with colors at different times of day, and a determination to rise to the challenge of atmospheric perspective. But is that all there is?

That's a question I often ask, especially when I produce a landscape painting that is perfectly, technically excellent but lacking in spirit. Is it because I'm not really connecting with the spirit of the place? Am I so focused on the mechanics (including sunscreen, bug spray, and the nearest bathroom) that I'm not really feeling the place? Does it make a big difference when I am en plein air (on site) vs. working from a photograph?

I do love landscapes. I am awed by the beauty of God's creation. I also love the man-made elements of landscape, especially when a building seems to nestle into the landscape as though God himself put it there. But I'll admit, I often don't take the time to drink up the scene; to smell it, feel it, and consciously consider what's special about it (other than the artistic considerations of composition, light and value).

Maybe that's what I'm missing. So, here goes another process experiment.... Tomorrow, I will take five minutes to meditate in place, allowing the setting to register with all my senses. Then, we'll see what happens. Meanwhile, I'm posting my latest plein air piece in the Daily Art album.

The Groove Continued

In my last post I described what I thought would be a "groovy" new process for combining plein air and studio painting to get closer to my goal of a landscape painting that not only captures "place," but also the "feel" of the place. At that point I had not yet followed the process to the end, so here's the rest of the story.

After doing a sketch and acrylic value painting in the field, I went to my studio and laid on oil paint in a thin, smooth layer. The next day, I took the painting back to the field and laid on more oil paint, this time in bolder strokes, to capture more of the feel of the place.

This painting spot happens to be in Mt. Olivet Cemetery near the University of Utah campus. The first day I went there to paint, I picked out a spot with a beautiful little Madonna and Child statue. I had no sooner begun sketching when I was run off by the grounds crew mowing and trimming the grass. I loaded all my stuff back in the car and drove around the cemetery some more. I was hoping to find a place where I could also see some mountains in the background, which was difficult because the cemetery is dense with trees. But finally I found a spot that had great potential: mountains, trees, tombstones, and a poetically appropriate dead tree. The sun shone on the dead tree making it as white (or whiter) than the lightest granite stone. I was fortunate to be in the shade of a large pine tree. I was not bothered by the mowers this time. Nor did I have a close encounter with any of the deer family that inhabits the cemetery. 

A quiet resting place makes a quiet painting place. See the results in my Daily Art.

Who has the juiciest paint?

Tonight I went gallery strolling in Salt Lake City. At the gallery where I exhibit, the featured artist is Debra Marin, a wonderful painter of landscapes in oil (see her work at www.artatthemain.com). She's one of those accomplished artists who make it look so easy - wonderful atmospheric perspective, naturalistic-but-not-boring colors, and good, juicy paint.

The quality of the paint is something I've been looking at in others' work. It's not that I'm crazy about thick, impasto paintings. But I like to see the brush strokes. I like to stand back and let my eye blend the strokes and then stand closer and be surprised at a bold stroke, in just the right color, and placed just right. 

I visited several other galleries also looking particularly at landscapes with that wonderful paint quality and I learned something from every one: Rick Graham's work at the Avenues Art Gallery; Kate Starling at Williams Fine Art; Susan Gallacher at Williams and at Patrick Moore and King's Academy galleries. 

In addition to looking at the paint application, I looked particularly at trees. There's a real skill in making trees look real without trying to paint every leaf. There's also a skill in mixing greens so that you can tell one type of tree from another, separating the foreground trees from mid-ground and distant trees, and getting the trees to visually overlap to create depth. Susan's work is a particularly good primer on this skill.

So now I'm thoroughly inspired and can hardly wait to get outside in tomorrow's 100+ degree heat and see what I can do!

The "Doppelganger" effect

Recently I was browsing artists' web sites that were posted to a Linked In group. I like to see the art as well as how the site is designed. I stumbled on an artist whose work is very similar to some of my recent abstracted landscapes that I bragged about not long ago. The artist's web site had a way of slightly enlarging the thumbnail images as you slid the curser over them. While I've seen this used effectively on some sites, on this particular one, the images did not enlarge by much and they all sort of flowed together in a way that made all the images look very similar. And they were very similar in color palette, style, and subject. 

I might have liked one or two of the paintings had I seen them separated by a little time (a couple of seconds) and distance, but run together as they were, the result was boring. And then I wondered if this was perhaps a handy test we might use as we look at our own art. Art instructors are always advising us to turn the painting upside down, or look at it in a mirror, to better see the bones of the composition. 

At the same time I was making this sort of academic assessment of web site design and presentation effects, my inner critic was screaming, "This artist's work is so similar it's boring. My work is a lot like this artist's work. Therefore, my work is boring, too!" Have you ever been told by a friend, "I saw this woman who looks so much like you she could be your double, your doppelganger!" Then, you see the other woman and you're horrified.

That was the unfortunate effect of seeing this other artist's web site. After telling my inner critic to take a hike, I went back to my academic assessment. Yes, flipping through my images quickly might be a useful tool for spotting the too similar, predictable, boring aspects of my work; or, on the other hand, making sure there's an interesting sort of unity that runs through the body of work, without being boring.

And I also made a note to self: Don't use a web site effect that makes images run together so quickly that the viewer does not see the unique qualities of each piece.

Switching Media

It's good to switch your medium every once in a while and see what creativity feels like in an unfamiliar place. That's what I did last weekend in a workshop on concrete sculpture. I went from two dimensions to three; from colorful paint to gray concrete; from paintbrush to saw and files; from landscapes to figurative. The result was "Poo Cat," a concrete planter somewhat resembling a Mexican tribal artifact.

"Not bad for a first sculpture," pronounced my instructor, Jynja Calderon ( http://www.absolutearts.co

m/portfolios/j/jynja/).  She was a patient, yet demanding, instructor through the mixing, pouring, and 5+ hours of carving. As she worked on her own sculpture beside me, we were both in our zones throughout the afternoon, hardly noticing one of the most dramatic of the thunder storms we've been having here.

While working with concrete was certainly different for me, some things about the creative process were the same. I began with a sketch of my vision of the finished piece. I gave myself permission to change my vision as I discovered the challenges of working in concrete, essentially carving away everything that wasn't "cat." I gained confidence with each passing hour as I became more experienced with the tools, learning how much pressure to apply, how much concrete to take off at a time.

I know many artists who are timid about trying new techniques or media, and I can remember feeling that way, too. But the more I create, the more daring I am. As I stare a new project in the face, I feel invincible; I have a powerful sense of "Yes, I can," and I'm willing to take more risks.

Check out Poo Cat in my Daily Art album.

Connecting the Dots

Tomorrow I will complete the first assignment in my landscape painting class. It was one of those academic exercises that makes you want to scream in frustration but in the end teaches the precise lesson the instructor intended. And I really needed this exercise.

Though I've painted landscapes many times before, I have never felt my effort showed much passion. I've worked mostly from photographs and I've tried faithfully to paint what I see in the photo, editing or changing a few details for the sake of composition. But I readily admit to approaching landscapes with that "beginner mentality" - the sky is blue, the trees are green, and so on in a most predictable way. Unless I'm painting Utah's red rock country, my landscapes usually end up with too much boring green.

The class exercise challenged us to focus on value and temperature, starting with a warm toned canvas, then a violet underpainting, followed by a pointalist style of applying tinted dots of primary colors side by side and allowing the eye to blend them into the local color of the landscape we're painting. Though blue and yellow mixed make green, the eye does not get green from a blue dot beside a yellow dot. So, the last step is to apply some (as few as necessary) "cheater" dots of green to suggest green trees or grass.

However, even before the application of cheater dots, my painting was so much more interesting and alive than all the mostly-green landscapes I've ever painted. Furthermore, the exercise forced me to think really hard about the temperature relationships between objects close and objects far away. The sunlight reflecting on trees farther away isn't the same temperature as sunlight on the leaves in the foreground. 

If you're a painter, you may read this and think, "well, duh," as I did. On some level I already knew this. But I had never challenged myself to paint to the theory rather than taking that unthinking, knee-jerk approach to painting the green I think I see.

This exercise has not made me want to paint like Serat all the time, but it has given me the confidence to depart from the boring and predictable. I'm posting my landscape exercise in my daily art album even though it's not quite finished.

 

Cabin Fever

Living in the desert, I don't expect a monsoon season in June. But here we are. And wouldn't you know, this is the year I'm taking plein air painting! Fortunately, our first assignment, which I will complete today, is a landscape as seen through the third floor window of the art building. This I can work on while warm and dry. The challenge comes when the clouds obscure the mountains and I can't remember where the shadows fell on the last sunny day we painted.

I can't wait to get outside with my paints, and I promise not to complain about heat, sun poisoning, or bugs. I just want to get on with the experimentation and learning. I'm eager to practice big, luscious paint strokes that are spot-on in color and placement; that the viewer sees as a paint stroke up close but recognizes as a tree from a distance.

I want to paint my mostly green backyard in reds and blues and purples that the viewer will recognize as lush vegetation in a private backyard sanctuary. 

I want to paint my own interpretation of mountains, canyons, and red rock that speaks of my sense of awe at God's amazing artistry.

Hoping for drier weather next week.