Archive for the ‘Plein Air Art’ Category
Judging Landscape Paintings
Damar Minyak, of Kansas City (area), MO, wrote a response to the January 20, 2012 newsletter written by Robert Genn, Canadian landscape painter. It touched me because I feel very much the same way.
“History has shown that those who set themselves up as arbiters of “proper art” are wrong, almost 100% of the time. Consider as the prime example, the Impressionists, who set themselves up because the museums and “art experts” of their day refused their products. Today, it seems, almost everybody wants to pretend to the title “neoimpressionist” or “post impressionist” or “non-impressionist”, or whatso-everist. Judged shows usually mean “It all has to look like our stuff.” Virtually all of the artists I respect were the renegades of their periods. So, it remains, for my contemporaries. Being told I’m not doing it correctly just makes me smile, and say, ‘Thank you!’ “
Selling Landscape Paintings
More and more artists are their own best handlers. They manage their distribution, their retail prices and their futures. Some of the current artists have closed out dealers altogether and make a handsome living selling on eBay and other inexpensive venues.
“Consignment is by far the best system,” says Robert Genn, Canadian landscape painter. “An artist’s efforts can be taken back and moved to other galleries – perhaps to ones with a more favorable commission structure.”
Particularly since the 2008 financial shakedown, Genn said he noticed that a lot more art buyers are contacting artists directly. Internet savvy and well-informed, they are people who seldom go to commercial galleries, but have a particular desire to get to know artists. They are not necessarily looking for deals. It may be that more people are trying to “think smart” these days and are like those who do their own research and buy stocks and bonds online. Maybe individual empowerment and self-management are the new normal.
New Year’s Resolutions for the Landscape Painter
Here we are almost a week into the New Year. Have all you landscape painters made your New Year’s resolutions? What do you want to achieve this year? Usually we make a few resolutions, then life gets in the way, and in a few weeks we have forgotten or neglected our heartfelt desires.
If you decide that this will be “your year”, you will need to: 1) Write down your goals. This gives you the focus to follow through. Make them realistic, but with leeway. Put this list where you can see it every day. 2) Make a plan. Develop a roadmap to achieve the goals and desires you want for this year. 3) Set a deadline. When you have a deadline for achieving a goal, you are more likely to follow through and actually make it happen. Highlight the deadline date for each idea and look at it every day. Challenge yourself to finish each idea by the selected deadline. 4) The “how” comes once you have decided to follow your dreams. So, decide what you want for the year, make a plan, set a deadline for each idea and know that the “how” will take care of itself.
The Landscape Painter’s Vision
Happy New Year, everyone! Do you ever wander back to that time when you first started thinking about making art? Do you ever think of the vision that you first had – how your art would be made, its themes, its looks? How simple it was then. For some of us it was just a matter of learning the skills and enacting our vision.
Then with a little seasoning under our belts, we modified, changed, expanded, contracted. We grew – or perhaps regressed. We landscape painters are constantly faced with forks in our roads – and the realization that some of the paths we take are a genuine pressing ahead with our dreams, and others a caving into demands and the easy backslide into mediocrity. It’s sometimes possible to confuse creativity with compromise.
Perhaps it’s a matter of figuring out what is true. Take a break regularly and reassess where you are going, review whether you are doing what you truly like and want to do. What are you doing right? What is uniquely yours? Which subjects and stylistic elements give you satisfaction?
Go back to your dreams. Feel the evolution since the beginning as a natural unfolding. Think of misguided moves only as potholes and part of the process. Breathe deeply, be thankful and be true to your true self.
Robert Genn, Landscape Painter
Today I received the book Robert Genn’s Twice Weekly Letters from July 10, 1999 to September 25, 2009. It is a good 2” thick volume and was my gift for joining the Premium Artists on his website, The Painter’s Keys. I shall enjoy reading that for a long time to come.
I love receiving his twice weekly newsletters. They are witty, thoughtful and informational. Genn is a landscape painter who paints mostly in acrylics, sometimes in oils, as I understand it. He lives near Vancouver, BC, Canada. He doesn’t teach, but conducts occasional workshops with his daughter. Examples of his current work, galleries and art dealers can be found at www.robertgenn.com.
How to Critique Yourself – for the Plein Air Painter
Robert Genn, Canadian plein air painter, in his November 18, 2011 newsletter, answered someone’s question about how to critique one’s own work. Here, in part is his answer:
Quality develops when the artist and the critic are honed into a functioning co-op within the same skull. The “ritual” is to pry the artist away from the critic. The artist can be flamboyant, egocentric and prejudiced. The critic needs to be patient, humble and strict. A split personality may be the price you have to pay to see your work through fresh, unsullied eyes. The operation doesn’t hurt–much.
Divorcing yourself from the preciousness of your efforts and seeing your work as it really is takes time and mileage. This means “alone time” in your working area. No quality work or strong direction will arise in environments where consultants are readily available.
A valuable ploy is to constantly upgrade and rethink standards of excellence, most often done through books and other media. The mere act of holding onto great works or seeing them in museums magically transfers a sense of timelessness and creative soul. Fact is, you will not generally improve by misguided staring at your own efforts.
The Impatient Plein Air Painter (3)
If you are a plein air painter, perhaps you are interested in the differences in painting and handling between alkyds and traditional oils. Michael Chesley Johnson’s article in the December 2011 edition of the Artist’s Magazine lists some suggestions for working with alkyds.
Because alkyds dry quickly, you’ll want to put out only the amount you need for a session. Also, consider a paper palette which you can throw away; a wooden palette is harder to clean after painting with alkyds. You must discard alkyds because they will be unusable the next day. If you mixed the alkyds with traditional oils, the mixtures will take longer to dry than they would with straight alkyds.
Alkyd colors tend to be more transparent than traditional oil paints. Alkyds from the same manufacturer tend to dry with the same even finish. Windsor & Newton’s alkyds have a semi gloss finish; Gamblin’s give a matte finish. Be sure to clean your brushes right away; otherwise, the paint will dry on the brushes and ruin them. If you continue to paint with traditional oils, you may want to put aside a special set of brushes that you use only for alkyds.
The Style of a Landscape Painter
It has always amazed me that if several landscape painters lined up to paint the same scene no two would produce paintings that looked the same. The compositions would be organized differently, the artists would choose different colors to represent the landscape and they would apply the paint differently.
Ultimately one’s experiences and personality enable each artist to create a painting style unique to that person. One’s personality influences every choice, whether the subject is depicted realistically or abstractly, the strokes loosely or tightly, and the colors used. The painter’s style is as unique as his signature.
The Vision of the Landscape Painter
When deciding on a view to paint, the landscape painter must ask self what it is about the view that is exciting and makes you want to paint it. That is what the painting is about. That is the main idea that will carry you to a successful conclusion. Is the main idea a color event, a powerful arrangement of shapes, a profound use of space, or an abstract idea? Is there an “Aha!” moment that will surprise and delight the viewer?
If the subject is simply a barn, then how can the visual language be used to capture the “barn essence”? Will the subject convey meaning to the viewer on more than just a visual level? Perhaps an emotional level?
If you are not immediately aware of an outstanding aesthetic event, you may need to dive in and start working. The best way to get to know a subject is to paint or draw it. Often, the process of painting itself – composing, mixing colors, exploring value patterns, and pushing paint around – reveals visual dynamics that were not apparent when you first saw the subject.
Subject and Vision of the Plein Air Painter
Every good painting is about something, and that “something” is more than the literal subject matter. The most exciting plein air paintings offer a unique interpretation of the world by focusing on an aesthetic experience that becomes the painting’s reason to be.
On the most basic level, every representational painting is, in part, about content and subject matter. On another level, the subject is a vehicle for the artist to explore the visual language of painting: color, composition, value, form, movement, and the paint itself. Is the subject the barn sitting at the end of a field, or is it about a color experience – a red shape poised against a green field? Which event is the dominant statement – the barn or the color experience?