Posts Tagged ‘plein air’
The Undiscovered Plein Air Painter
Recently I came upon a discussion by some of the many million plein air painters who are trying to sell their art. All felt that selling was the key to a happy life.
However, others disagreed: Someone quoted a friend: “Paintings are sold when they are painted, not when they are sold.” “Why not just take the time to make better art?” suggested Robert. “An artist is one who creates art. Create the best art you are capable of creating, because you must, and for the joy and satisfaction of creating it. The rest will take care of itself.” said Carl. Deborah suggested Deborah Paris’ book, Studio & Business Practices for Successful Artists and can be found on her blog. Virginia mentioned Alyson Stanfield’s book, I’d Rather [Be?] in the Studio also that Stanfield has an informative blog. Lastly, Donald suggested that the books by Jack White, artist and author, are on Amazon as well as on his web site and are highly recommended.
Children and the Arts
In addition to the five blog spots per week I write about plein air painting for this blog, I also write two more for an online mall with which I am associated called Easy Place to Shop (http://www.easyplacetoshop.com). One blog spot is about children and the arts, the other is about home décor.
It is so important for children to become involved in the arts – whether music, drama, or painting. In school, children give memorized answers or answers arrived through calculation. In the arts, they learn about feelings, that problems can have more than one solution, that there are many ways to see the world, that small differences can have large effects, that neither words nor numbers define the limits of our understanding, that the arts enable us to have experiences we can have from no other source and through these experiences, we can discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling. In short, the arts enrich our lives.
Pony Penning
This past week was the annual Pony Penning at Chincoteague, VA. It all started many years ago after a big fire at Chincoteague that the town decided they needed a Volunteer Fire Department (VFD). Then the question became how to raise money for the expenses needed.
Wild ponies, descendents of those who fled the sinking Spanish galleons of 3 centuries or so ago, live on Assateague Island, barrier island that runs from Ocean City, MD, to Chincoteague, VA. Each year the Chincoteague “cowboys” drive the 150 or so ponies across the narrow waterway between the barrier island and the mainland. The fittest are auctioned off for the VFD and the rest are returned to the island. Many thousands of people come each year to the event, the last full week of July.
This event has been made famous in the children’s book Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry which was based on a real horse named Misty and which won a Newberry Award in 1948. In September, I go to Chincoteague for a plein air Paint Out contest.
Plein Air Painting at Wild Acres
For 5 years, each July, I attended an art workshop at Wild Acres, North Carolina, about 40 miles from Asheville and 3 miles from Little Switzerland on the Blue Ridge Parkway. I felt like a kid at camp. All I had to do was eat, sleep and paint as the food was prepared for us and when the dinner bell rang, we all assembled in the dining room for a wonderful repast.
On Fridays, each class showed what they had done for the week – the printmakers, the ceramic artists, photographers, studio artists, and plein air artists. I was amazed that consistently, the paintings of the plein air artists had much more color, feeling and life than those of the studio artists.
Gauguin in Tahiti
Gauguin took his oil painting discovery even further in Tahiti, which also did not fulfill his dream of finding the “noble savage” – as Europeans had already turned the island into an extension of Europe. But he was able to use the contrast between what he had hoped for and what he found. He often placed a primitive scene in the foreground and images of civilized life in the background, and eliminated perspective and shading so the background encroached on the foreground.
Gauguin’s manipulation of traditional perspective and his expressive use of color had a major influence on the late -19th- and early -20th-century art movements especially Fauvism and Expressionism. In 1901, Picasso saw several Gauguin paintings at a friend’s home, and they inspired him to launch into his Blue Period. It is no wonder that he is among the founders of modern art.
The Flatwoods Preserve
Today was another good day for plein air painting, so my friend and I set off again for Pine Island. We stopped at the Flatwoods Preserve near the southern end of the island.
Flatwoods Preserve has a hiking trail just over a mile long and several hikers passed by and said “Hello.” There is not much else there except slash pine trees, dead trees, local grasses and palmettos.
The birds soared overhead, the planes left vapor trails and the clouds moved slowly across the sky. Whether or not my picture turns out well, I still had a great day!
Plein Air Painting at RRC
Last Friday, my friend and I packed all our painting equipment in the car and set out for the Randell Research Center on Pine Island. We have been there other years so it was not new to us. She planned to use two 10″ x 20″ canvasses as a diptych because the 18″ x 18″ canvasses which she had ordered had not arrived yet. I had a 30″ x 30″ canvas that I wanted to use.
After 2 hours or so of plein air painting, we were ready to call it a day. She had used only one of her canvasses to paint a shell mound and it was completely covered with paint. (That’s the first objective – to get the canvas completely covered!) I chose a grouping of palm trees with a few deciduous trees nearby. My drawing was finished and some photos taken. I had started painting the grass and mulch around the trees – going from bottom to top of the canvas – not my usual method. I’ll have plenty more to do on this painting back home in the studio!
The Randell Research Center
The Randell Research center (RRC) is a program of the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville, Florida, which has conducted research and educational programs in Southwest Florida for over 20 years. The RRC existed since 1994 when Donald and Patricia Randell gifted 53 +/- acres of the 200 acre Pineland archeological site to the University of Florida Foundation.
With more than 28 million specimens and artifacts in its permanent collections, the Florida Museum is the largest collections based natural history museum in the southern United States. These collections are the foundation of the Museum’s scientific research and university teaching programs. The Museum also uses these collections to inspire and educate the public about Florida’s natural history and rich cultural heritage.
On a recent Heritage Day the theme was “Art, Authors and Archeology”. Landscape artists were doing plein air paintings, an author was selling his books, and archeologists were having children sift sand from the Indian mound through a 20″ x 20″ screen to show them how archeologists research the life and times of the Indians.
Pissarro: The Father Figure
Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) was the father figure and peacemaker of the Impressionists. He mentored Cezanne and Gauguin and cautioned them “Do not define too closely the outline of things. It is the brushstrokes of the right color and value that should produce the drawing.”
A patient teacher, Pissarro instructed Cezanne in how to control form through color and diagonal strokes. Cezanne called him, “humble and colossal.” Pissarro was a dedicated plein air painter and he daily took his canvas in search of a scene which he reproduced with bright colors and patchy brush strokes. He is also known for bustling Parisian street scenes filled with people and carriages rendered in spots of colors, as if viewed from a second story window.
Renoir: Happy People in Pretty Places
Pierre-August Renoir (1841-1919) thought a picture should be a pleasant thing, joyful and pretty. He loved painting lovely female faces and forms, sunlit meadows and gardens, and open-air cafes.
Renoir invented the dappled-light effect which he used so effectively throughout his career. He never used black and sometimes his figures went off the edge of the page. His early paintings have a snapshot feel – a slice of life has been captured on canvas before the scene shifts. The dappled light, the quick brushstrokes and sketchiness of painting resulted in a distinctive impressionist look.
Later, instead of focusing on fleeting moments, he wanted his art to make a lasting impression. He went to Rome to study with the Renaissance masters and especially liked Raphael’s work. As a result, his figures became much more solid. Solid figures and blurred backgrounds became the trademark of his mature style.