Floating Down Denial River

The other day I was up in the loft of my studio, looking for some stretcher bars for a project I had in mind.  As is usually the case, when I start one thing, I soon get distracted by another.  Since the loft is also the home of mis-fit paintings, I started to look through them.  Every once in a while, I stumble upon an old reject that I think I can rescue.  Anyway, I was looking at these (too many) sad paintings-- heck, some had even been in galleries-- when I stumbled upon an atrocious, foul, monumentally horrid piece of crap painting of mine.


You might think I'm being hard on myself here, and maybe you're right.  If you disregard the extremely poor drawing; overlook the impossible perspective, never mind the banal composition, and close your eyes to the dull, muddy, uninteresting colors, you would be left with a painting that might be better served as a liner for a parakeet cage.


It was so bad, I felt like sticking my face near a wasp nest in hopes they might sting my eyes so I wouldn't have to look at it anymore.

It was so bad, I looked up pictures of Judge Judy in a swimsuit on the internet so I could burn the image of that disgusting painting out of my mind.  Yeah, I know-- torture.  But it had to be done...


The offending painting was done plein air a few years ago.  But here's what makes this tale all the more embarrassing-- I actually put this wretched piece up for sale in a wet-paint auction.  Yeah, back when I squatted down and produced this piece of "art" I honestly thought someone would pay money for it!  Oh, dear Lord!  What was I thinking?!  Surprise, surprise!  It didn't sell.  Well, needless to say, with the help of an exacto knife, this monstrosity is no longer a part of the Mizner Catalogue Raisonne`.


Now, I had done far better pieces long before I did this one, and I also like to think-- hell, I know-- I've done far better since.  So, I kind of shrugged it off as, "hey, they all can't be winners..."  But then the other night I woke up bathed in flop sweat.  The thought had come to me:  Sure, my ability to paint may have improved, but has my assessment of my paintings gotten better?  Am I better able to recognize a badly done piece now, than I was back then?


That's a slippery slope, isn't it?


You see, I usually judge the success of my painting on how close it comes to my original concept.  Did I do what I wanted to do in the way I wanted to do it?  The overwhelming majority of the time, that answer is "no."  The viewer of my painting, however, doesn't have my vision in mind.  All they have to look at is the painting.  But my success in doing what I originally envisioned doesn't necessarily make it a good painting.  The ability to see my work through other's eyes is called discernment.  I sure as hell didn't use discernment then, that's for sure!  But if I can't trust myself to assess my painting, how can I discern how others will see it?



Doesn't one need to have some self-confidence to be successful?  You know, the "To hell with what they say!" mentality.  I can't very well become frozen with doubt about every painting I do, can I?  Nothing will ever see the light of day, then.  So, I guess you can add that to the long list of things to think about when painting;

Is this painting as good as I think it is, or am I merely floating down denial river?


I really need to work on this, because I know one thing with absolute certainty:


I never want to see this again!

  


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So...What Do You Do For A Living?

It should surprise no one that I love art.  I enjoy talking about art.  I will chat with anyone about painting, the art scene-- even the onerous stuff like art marketing.  What I don't like to talk about is my art.  As a reader of this blog, you might notice that on occasion, along with my usual blather, I will post a painting of mine.  I might talk about how I did it, or what inspired me to do it, but I don't often tell you what I think of it.  The reason is simple:  I feel a painting has to speak for itself.  It is what it is.  As soon as you view my painting, you will form an opinion of it that no words of mine will change.  You would either agree, or not.  

When I'm out in public, I don't talk much about my painting or my vocation, only to answer the question, "What do you do for a living?" with the reply, "I'm an oil painter".  That is usually followed by murmurs of appreciation.  "Oh, my-- you paint all day.  How nice!"  Quite often, the follow up question is, "Does your wife work?"  I'm an honest guy.  I tell the truth.  So I say, "Yes she does".  That does it right there.

"Oh.... well then... You don't really make a living at art then..."

In the minds of the questioner, I have gone from Professional Artist to Un-Employed Wannabee.

Wanna know a little secret?  I punched a clock for many years before I painted full time.  My wife worked too back then.  We needed two incomes to help pay the mortgage and feed the kids.  Did that mean I wasn't really working?  That I didn't make a living at my job?


These days, I leave my house every morning to go to my studio and work on my art.  When I have a painting done, it goes to one of the galleries that represent me.  Then I hope for the best, and work on more paintings.  So does that make me an amateur if weeks go by without a sale, and a pro only when one sells?


Like I said, I'm an honest guy;  I have had times as a painter when paintings flew off the walls, and money was coming in at a steady pace.   I will also freely admit that there have been occasions when times where tight enough for me to go pick up a job.  Back in the day, I would often work two jobs when I needed to. But if I do that now, is it now my vocation, or am I moonlighting?  Does it push me back to wannabee status? 


We all know that there are only a damn few artists (And I will wager that like me, you're not one either) who know that they will quickly sell whatever they produce.  The rest of us?  We soldier on.  Look, painting is hard enough without worrying about your status as an artist.  It shouldn't make a damn bit of difference whether you are rich or starving.  The only thing I personally care about is making the best painting I can produce.  It isn't what I do for a living--


It's what I do for life.


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Random Randomness

Thoughts while waiting for the heat to break:

I'm thinking this is one Long Art Summer.  I've been to two art openings (because I'm in them), and I have a Paint Out and Auction for this weekend in Cape Elizabeth, and another in New Hope, Pennsylvania two days after that.  All the while I'm trying to work up some paintings for two more openings in August.  If frenetic activity was considered a sign of success, I'd be famous.  But, alas...


Never in my life have I ever got poison ivy.  I used to boast that I could roll naked in that stuff, and I still wouldn't get it.  No, I didn't roll naked, but my shins and ankles have some lovely, blistered splotches of the stuff that itches like mad.  I must have set my easel up right in the middle of a patch while I was painting the piece below.  Jeez, I'm wicked smaht!

I'm gonna need an ocean of Calamine lotion...


Another thought about poison ivy:  Since I have no previous experience with the stuff, I thought all I had were itchy bug-bites (I've had plenty of those in my life)  so I scratched and scratched with abandon!  Lesson learned...


The other day on the great art blog Underpaintings by Matthew Innes, (I look forward to that blog everyday) Matthew posted a photo of Daniel Greene's palette, with all the colors he uses laid out.  He even gave out detailed instructions on how to mix the individual strings of color.  Tell you what:  Give me that palette, and throw in Mr. Greene's brushes to boot, and I still could never paint as well as he.  It's like saying "If I had Michelangelo's stone carving set, I'd make the Pieta!"  It's the carpenter, not the tools...

My studio gets awful hot in the Summer.  I only have windows on one side, so, I get no air circulation, which leaves it rather muggy inside.  I have A/C, but it cools the place off to about 80 degrees.  The wasps love it!  They get in and dive-bomb my head non-stop all day long.  I've yet to be stung, but it becomes rather disconcerting; Imagine trying to paint while keeping one eye on some hideous, loathsome insect as it comes in for a landing on your nose.  It almost makes me yearn for Winter-- when the studio can get down to zero degrees to start the day.  But hey-- no bugs!...



I've been painting out of doors alot this year.  Mostly to warm-up for the plein air events I've mentioned above.  But, damn-- all that green!  I used to mix my greens with a yellow and a couple different blues.   I thought that buying pre-mixed greens was "cheating".  I've gotten over that.  I now will haul out Sap green, Azo green, Veridian, Light Green-- you name it, if there's green on the label, I want it!  I just finished this little piece in the studio to take a break from all that green:

I'm trying to grow an elm tree to plant next to my studio.  I love elm's.  Once upon a time in the 19th Century, they lined all those Elm Streets that now have nothing but light posts to cast shade.  Dutch Elm Disease wiped out millions of those majestic trees in the 1960's.  I obtained some seeds from disease resistant elms a couple of years ago and watched daily to see if they would take.  We got some sprouts, but then-- nothing.  I had one twig grow to about two inches, but then it died.  I tried to revive it by moving into different sunny spots around the house, but after six weeks of twigdom, I gave up and put the pot it was in out in the mud room and forgot about it.  Three months later it sprouted again!  It grew leaves and about another inch in height for six weeks, or so.  Then, Winter came.  This Spring, I thought it would take off where it left off.  No.  Even though we had an early Spring and everything else that uses Photosynthesis thrived, my elm just sat there-- a three inch twig.  Once again, I gave up on it.  My dog Champ even knocked it over, spilling it and its soil all over the ground.  I just scooped it up and set it back outside.

Wonders never cease.  It took off shortly after that and is now over a foot in height, with branches sprouting out every which way!  My daughter calls it the "Jesus Tree".  Now, will I live long enough to see it cast shade on my studio roof?  Probably not, but I do hope that one day someone will lie under its branches and thank me.


Someday, little guy.  Someday...

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Why, I Never!

I hit a milestone recently.  It wasn't my fault, I'm old and my eyes are bad, and it shouldn't have been there to begin with! 


I also turned fifty this year.


I've got nothing against fifty, mind you.  I'm hanging in there.  Heck, my Doctor told me I'm as healthy as an eighteen year-old-- who has the body of a fifty year-old.  But never mind.  I kind of like what comes with age.  Perspective, for one. 


Artists like to say that "There are no rules", which they know is a load of horse-pucky. Some painters loudly proclaim to never use photos. Others limit their plein air or alla prima painting time to one sitting, because going back twice is "cheating".  I admit I bought into some of that stuff way back when.



When I was younger and just starting out as a painter, I had a series of rules I would follow.  One of them was the "My picture came to me by Divine Intervention; I never change it!"  So I would come up with an idea, then paint it as I first thought of it.  Never mind such little things as design.  Or composition.  In other words, I didn't work to come up with the best possible angle for my picture.  It's kinda like a writer who thinks his first draft is good enough.  Is it ever?


Nowadays, I fret endlessly over how best to convey my idea.  I'll research, plan, sketch, erase, sketch again, just to improve upon the original "Divine" idea.  Yeah, even landscapes get that treatment.  But even with all of that pre-planning, I still look back at many a painting and say, "Why didn't I think to do that?!"


Which leads me to another discarded rule: "I never touch a painting after I signed it!"  If it comes out crappy-- well that's too bad.  Or maybe I just couldn't figure out how to paint that passage.  Oh well, better luck next time.  It's all a learning game anyway, isn't it?


In all honesty, I gave up on this one not all that long ago.  If, after I think a painting is done and signed, I see where I can improve it, I will.  I very rarely varnish my paintings, so I can paint over them just like new.  If I discover a better color, or a way to fix a poor passage, I'm all over it.  What have I got to lose?  I've said it before, and I'll say it again:  If I see my fly is down after I'm "done" dressing in the morning, I still zip it up!


Over the course of time, I have discarded my rules one by one.  Except for one.  I have a sign in my studio that reads:

Parcos Nullus Intentio


The sign isn't there because it's something I habitually do, but rather to remind me to do it.  Look, all I want to do is make the best painting I can possibly make-- whatever it takes.  It's the reason I do all those sketches, or correct flaws in old paintings.  It's why I'll drag my easel out to a painting site over and over, or take thousands of photographs to get a detail right.  It's why I worked on a lobster boat.  It's why I endlessly study great artists.  Roughly translated from Latin, it means


Spare No Effort


And that's the one rule I never want to break.



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High Noon

A couple of weeks ago, while I was reading the local newspaper, (they still do make such things, by the way) or in my case, looking at the pictures,  I came across an Artists Call to participate in a plein air event at the Boothbay, Maine Botanical Gardens.  Now, I'll be honest-- it wasn't so much the chance to paint flowers that got me interested, or to visit a lovely spot that I'd never seen before, but participating artists got to get in for free.

Sweet!


So on a beautiful Memorial Day, Ellen whipped up a lovely picnic lunch of fried chicken, potato salad with fruit salad for dessert.  Since I considered this a regular work day, I had my usual for lunch:  a package of Ring Dings.  Her lunch sure looked good, though. 


Anyway, since I had never been there before, I didn't want to bring my painting gear.  I know me; I would've picked the first plant I saw as close to the car as possible.  Instead, I wanted to explore the gardens to check out potential painting spots.  So with sketch book and camera in tow, we set off to explore the 250 lovely acres of woods, shoreline and, of course, flowers.

The Botanical Gardens are a mixture of natural terrain and man-made motifs.  Normally, when one paints landscapes, we try to incorporate design into the mayhem of Nature.  Here though, the garden was set up with picturesque designs in mind.  So really, everywhere I looked, I could spot a good scene to paint.  But it wasn't until we had our lunch that I found my spot.  Way in the back corner of the Garden, near the Rhododendron bushes is a beautiful, serene waterfall.  Water and rocks-- right up my alley!   I grabbed my sketch book, and went at it.

I prepared my masonite panel later that day back at the studio.  Unfortunately, it rained hard for the next two days, so I had to twiddle my thumbs and wait for the sun to come back.  When it did, back to the park I went.  I hiked way back to that secluded spot, set my gear up in what was mulch, but was now ankle deep mud, swatted the mosquitoes, and went at it.  Most plein air types (of which I am not) hate to paint in the middle of the day.  The sun shining directly overhead make the shadows run and hide under the rocks, and completely washes out color.  Also, it's easier to find the right color when the sun is angling lower in the sky.  We really don't have a tube of color that can match the highlights of a noon-time sun.  I find all of that a challenge.  Bring it on!  So my picture is of the falls at lunchtime.

The participating painters will have a selection of our efforts hanging at the Botanical Gardens until the end of the month of June, with a reception on June 14th.  Hope you can make it!


I think you'll have to bring your own Ring Dings.


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Long Drawn Out

I may have mentioned before that I am the self-taught type.  It's not that I'm against formal education, but rather, I find it more fun to discover something than to be told about it.  Now, there's different kinds of discoveries when it comes to painting.  Like, did you know that if you add blue to yellow you make green?

Yeah-- who knew?

The other kind of discovery is finding out how the great artists worked.  When I first started to paint so many years ago, I would pore over a whole lotta books and magazines to find some little tip that would help me solve the puzzle of how to paint.  The concept of how-to DVD's and instructional videos was a long way off.  Being a huge fan of the 20th Century illustrators like Rockwell, NC Wyeth, and Tom Lovell (to name a few) I came to utilize their techniques on how to make a picture.  Not their style-- Lord knows, no one will mistake my work for theirs-- but their working methods. 

Learning their methods really taught me how paintings were done in the beginning of the Twentieth Century.  Wyeth and Rockwell were both taught by instructors who themselves learned and practised their craft in the Nineteenth Century.  So really, my technique is derived from rather ancient practises.  Even though a Wyeth is quite different from a Rockwell, which is different from a Lovell, they all did one thing the same, and it's a step I use too. 

The charcoal preparatory drawing. 

Artists of the past would make a full-scale tonal drawing, usually the same size as the intended painting.  They would then transfer the drawing onto canvas, then have at it with color.  You know, it's a step that's highly under-utilized in today's fast-paced, do it now kinda world, but it has it's advantages.  

The above is a charcoal drawing done by Norman Rockwell for a (never painted) Saturday Evening Post cover.  He has it all figured out in this step;  The design, composition, details and values.  All that's needed is color. 

And that's what painting is, isn't it?  Contrary to popular opinion, to me, painting isn't drawing.  Once you have everything else figured out, painting is merely applying color where it needs to be.


Here's an example by Tom Lovell:

Same thing;  All Lovell had to do with this is utilize his extraordinary color skills and bravura brush strokes on top of this drawing.


I find that when I do this step-- even on paintings I will do plein air, I do a better job.


Now, I'm going to post a couple of my drawings, but I don't want in anyway to make you think I am the equal of Rockwell and Lovell.


Can I get a Hell to the No! on that.


Anyway, this is the under-drawing for the painting I showed at the top of the page:

The old school way is to do this drawing on a separate piece of paper, but since I paint on gessoed masonite, I do it right on the board.



Here's another example, and this one I did in preparation for a picture I planned to do from life:

And here's the result:



Would I have been taught these draw-it-out techniques if I had gone to art school back in the mid nineteen seventies?  No way to know for sure-


But I highly doubt it.


Although, they might have taught me that whole green thing a lot sooner...


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Fitty-Thou

Today marks an outstanding milestone for Maine-ly Painting--  It has hit 50,000 page views!

[Insert picture of confetti here]

Hard to believe that Mom has viewed this blog 49,996 times.

For the rest of you who have visited,

Thank you!




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And The Emmy Goes To...

So last night I made my national television debut in the non- "...Arrested and charged with..." category.  The show is called My Ghost Story, and my daughter Leigh and I told our tale in what can only be described as the Beauty and the Beast segment.  Leigh looked lovely, and I filled the role of the puffy, pasty-faced father.  If you missed it, no big deal-- only that your lives will be slightly diminished as a result.  However, the Bio Channel's website will have it available for viewing in the next few days, and there are always repeat episodes, so fear not.  And if you have no idea of what I'm talking about, you can read this.

As always happens in Hollywood, my best scenes were left on the cutting room floor.  I had so many more "walk over here...now stop and turn around... now looked scared!" spots that were truly terrifying, it's a crime they didn't show them all.  I also had some killer dialogue that I was sure they would use.  Deep, meaningful stuff like, "Can you repeat the question?" and "I was so scared I could've crapped my pants!"  But with nearly two hours worth of interviews, and another couple hours of tape filmed at my house, they had to cut something to fit into an eight-minute segment.



Well, it was all fun, but I'm glad it's all in the rear-view mirror.  It's time I got back to un-interrupted painting.  I know how being on TV can become addictive to some, but it was a one-shot deal for me.  But then again, I did hear phantom footsteps in my bedroom closet one time, and I have seen strange shadows moving about the house at night.  Hey... maybe I can get on Ghost Adventures!...

Lights! Camera! Look Scared!

My Ghost Story, 10PM Saturday Night April 28, 2012 The Bio Channel

The road of life is one long blind curve, isn't it?  I mean, who knew that when I bought an old house so many years ago in a quiet Maine town that eventually it would lead me to Hollywood to film a segment for a TV show about ghosts?  Go figure.  I blogged about the goings on in that house in this post, and this one.  Go ahead and read 'em, I'll wait here for you.

On my word of honor, all that stuff is true.


Now, back when I bought the house Al Gore hadn't invented the internet, cars had extra little antenna's for their "mobile" phones, and cable TV had about 36 channels.  Now cable has about 226 channels, and of them, 221 have "reality" shows about auctions, homes and guns-- with a Kardashian thrown in-- and ghost shows.  Celebrity Ghosts, Ghost Hunters, Ghost Pets, Ghosts In The Machine, you name it, there's a ton of them.  After having gone through what I have, I admit I am a fan of the paranormal, so I'd watch those shows and think, "Man, if they could only hear about my ghosts, they'd flip out!"  That's where the show My Ghost Story comes in.  The premise of this show is actual people who have had paranormal experiences sit down and tell you about it, kind of like sitting around the camp-fire and telling ghost stories, but they have some kind of evidence; photos, recordings, and best of all- videos, to back them up.  So, I fired off an email to them and to my utter astonishment, they were interested in my story.  And that meant getting on a plane for a quick trip to L.A.


The story they were most interested in involved my daughter Leigh as well, so we both got to go.  I've been on enough flights in my life to know that I'd rather walk, but Leigh had never been on a plane in her life.  As we sat on the tarmac in a cigar tube with wings, she was not thrilled to see the flight crew winding up the rubber band to power the engines.  Suffice to say, she was a touch nervous.  But as always happens (except when a plane crashes and burns, killing all on board) we made it safely to LAX where we were picked up by a show staffer.  He's a nice guy who is also a screenwriter and has appeared on a couple of TV shows.


After checking in at the hotel by a very nice desk clerk-- who really is a screenwriter whose been in a couple of TV shows, we prepared for our on-screen "interview".  On the show, it's a person sitting there alone, telling a story.  Behind the scenes it's a cavernous, dark soundstage with three or four very bright spotlights shining in my face, and three cameras wizzing around my head as I told my tale to a woman sitting off-camera.  Periodically, a make-up lady would rush over to dab sweat off my brow, put my two hairs on the top of my head back in place, and apply more boot black to my beard.  Now, I had done some research on this show, and I had noticed that the story tellers would frequently say that they were "scared", or the ghosts were "evil,"  even "demonic," but I wasn't going there.  Instead, I tried to think of any other adjective, synonym and euphemism to use instead of "scared".  So it remains to be seen what a melodramatic twit I sound like.

Leigh in the make-up chair

After I was done, Leigh had her turn, but I didn't get a chance to watch her.  I did spend my time back in the green room chatting with some of the shows assistants.  They were really pleasant young men who are screen writers and who've appeared in a couple of TV shows.


A few weeks later, it was time for a cameraman to come out to the house to film some background scenes for use in the segment.  They use these shots as silent films to run while our voices play over them.  We couldn't use the original house, so we used mine.  I did ask the cameraman, whose name is Steve, to include as many shots of my paintings as he could.  Hey, a little free publicity can't hurt--am I right?  (Even though at no time during the interview did I mention that I am a painter...)  Steve filmed Leigh and me kind of reenacting our story.  As an example, he would set one of us up and say, "OK, sit in this chair and read a book...now look up... now look scared!"  Or, "In this scene I want you to walk through this room... now stop and look over your shoulder...now look scared!"  So now I can't wait to see how I look as a melodramatic twit... whose scared!

Steve, Me and Leigh admiring ourselves.

Leigh picking up some acting tips on how to look scared.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the high-light of our California trip was reconnecting with an Air Force friend of mine whom I hadn't seen in thirty years.  She showed Leigh and me around L.A., Venice beach, the Getty museum, and afterward we had a great time at the hotel bar reminiscing over a few drinks.  The bartender was a charming young man who is really a screenwriter and has even been in a couple of TV shows...


Like me!




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Jekyll And Hyde

Here is my latest from around the neighborhood:  Up River, oil on panel 18X14in.  This is the Eastern River, the same little brook that borders my property.  This view is of the upper series of waterfalls that, from here, descend another hundred yards or so.  Earlier this year I also did a picture of the waterfall on the top; Deep Wood Falls:

Like all bodies of water, they can have good days and bad days.  I think I've shown its good side.  But we have had about three inches of rain today, so it has gone from quiet and serene like this:

To raging, like this:

Moody little thing, isn't it?



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A Little Art History: Or, I Kinda Get It...

As a lover of history, I have learned not to judge the citizens of the past by today's standards and morals;  I think it's best to try and see things through the eyes of those who were there without the benefit of hindsight.  Take the habit of burning a witch at the stake, for instance.  Now, we cringe at the extreme stupidity and barbarous aspect of taking an innocent victim and burning them alive to expel a "witch".  "My goodness, what were they thinking?" we can ask ourselves.  But to the folks in what we call the Dark Ages, what they thought they were doing was kinda like an intervention.  They thought it a joyous occasion when they could steal a soul from the clutches of the devil and deliver it into the waiting and protective hands of the Almighty through the purifying power of fire.  Not quite so bad now, is it?  Still, it's a practice we frown upon today.

Another thing that's good to keep in mind when studying history:  The winners get to write it.


When I was young and just starting to learn about it, art was still in the middle of the Ice Age known as Contemporary Modern Art.  According to what I read, (in books, and not on Wikipedia...) we had the enlightenment that was the Renaissance, then the art equivalent of the Dark Ages until "true art" was finally born again at the beginning of the 20th Century with the coming of the Expressionism and Abstract movements.  Realism, when mentioned at all, was relegated to the French Impressionists of the 19th Century, with maybe a sideways glance at Thomas Eakins or Winslow Homer.  Other than that, it was a subject best not spoken of in polite society.


The impressionist were always cast as a group of Frenchmen who rebelled against the stuffy and stilted art Powers-That-Be, by painting their pictures outside En Plein Aire, and who figured out if you put a dab of yellow next to a dot of blue and stood back, it looked green.  Now, let's get back to talking about Jasper Johns, shall we?...


But, as with all things, there is more to the story.  The Powers-That-Be that were never mentioned in any book I read were Classical Academic painters like William Bouguereau, Jean-Lois Meissonier, and Jean-Leon Gerome, to name a few.  These were artists whose technical polish and skill were above reproach.  They painted stunning pieces depicting Greek mythology, with dancing Satyrs and beautiful Nymphs: or ancient Roman times, showing slave auctions and gladiator fights in loving detail; or massive canvases highlighting the wars and people of the Napoleonic era.  Not to mention the occasional street urchin, or comely peasant girl.  We look at these pieces today and rightfully see the immense talent and consummate skill that was needed to do them.  But all the Impressionists like Monet, Renoir, Cezanne et. al., saw were paintings that had absolutely no bearing on the world they lived in.

You know what?  I'm kinda going with the Impressionists on this one.


Don't get me wrong; I love the Academic painters.  I think Gerome, Bouguereau and all are absolutely fantastic artists.  But like the young-buck painters of the 1870's, I just don't buy into paintings of Greek Mythology, Ancient Roman life etc., either.  And when they tried to paint to the average guy with pleasing pictures of children and pretty peasant women, all I see is saccharine Victorian sentimentality at its worst.  Honestly, while I can understand and appreciate the talent involved, if I was told that only subject matter like that is considered Art, I'd rebel too.

Monet and company wanted to show what was recognizable to most Frenchmen:  A train station, canals, small villages that were populated with real, identifiable people.  They wanted honesty in their portrayals, so they went to the location and painted it from life, not from imagination in a studio.  You won't find any fierce Satyrs hiding in Monet's haystacks.  There are no rhapsodic Angels floating through Cezanne's skies.  And when Renoir wanted to paint a naked woman, he did-- and he didn't call her a "Nymph" or "Roman Slave".  Oh, and that yellow/blue dab thing?  It was an ingenious way of solving the problem of trying to convey the vibration of color and light that we see when out doors.

But most importantly:  The Impressionists won, so their descendants get to write the history.


Art books still lavish more praise on them than they do the 19th Century Academic painters.  The reason is that in the art tree of life, (as written by the current Powers-That-Be) the Impressionists are considered a vital root, while the poor Academics are relegated to Australo-Pithecus status; An evolutionary dead-end.  But the Ice Age is thawing from the art landscape, and as it recedes, the likes of Bouguereau and Gerome are coming into view again.  And the more they are seen, the more they become appreciated.  The more they become appreciated and held up as the ideal in painting, the more one other thing about history becomes evident:  The past always repeats itself.


That doesn't really bode well for witches, now- does it?

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Keeping It Real

If truth be told, I have a love/hate relationship with plein-aire painting.  It's kinda like how I feel fixing a flat tire:  If I do it right, everything will be OK, but I'd rather not have to have a flat to begin with.  Don't get me wrong, every once in a while, I saddle up my old french easel and head out into the great outdoors and have a go at it.  And surprisingly, I usually enjoy myself.  Go figure...

But I have noticed something about plein-aire paintings that I have seen in galleries or group shows, and that is they all seem to say, "Look at me!  Look at me!  I'm a Plein-Aire Painting!  Can't you tell by my non-existent edges, and clumps of broken color?  Just like Monet!  And that crooked box thing?  It's my impression of a house!"  (Between you and me, even when I squint and look over my shoulder at an angle, my first "impression" of a house is that it has straight lines.  Just sayin').  In other words, there is a bit of sameness that one sees in paintings done out-of doors; an expectation of how plein-aire is supposed to look.  It's my own personal taste I admit, but I'd rather a painting say "What" instead of "How"  if you know what I mean.   Then again, I'd be lying if I said that I haven't fallen into that trap myself once or twice.  Like with this:

I am at heart a studio painter.  Even more:  I'm a studio Landscape painter.  Now, there are those who will tell you that being a studio landscape painter is like being a virtuoso on the air guitar.  Whatever.  I like the familiarity of my work space.  But that doesn't mean I don't like the authenticity that painting from direct observation brings.  I just approach it in a different way.


I have been known to grab a studio piece and go outside and paint a passage from life.  Skies mostly.  It doesn't matter what or where my subject is, I can paint a sky from life just by stepping out of my studio door.  Kinda like what I did with this:

Even though this is my own damn back yard, for goodness sakes, I painted it in the studio.  I didn't like what I had for a sky though-- which was a plain old boring blue.  So I set this up outside and painted these clouds and sky from life.


Studio pieces aren't the only ones to get this treatment.  Check out this painting from last fall:

 


This painting was actually done plein-aire, even though the location is miles away from where I live, the sky was done one morning from my driveway. 


But I'm also not against fixing a painting in the studio that I've started on location.

I did a plein-aire painting of a blueberry field last summer that I've never been completely in love with.  It always seemed half done to me.  As a plein-aire, maybe it worked, but I wanted a little more finish, so a few days ago I grabbed it and went over every bit of it in the studio.  I didn't really re-paint the scene, but I carried what was there a little farther.  Here's where it was after three days of painting on location last summer:

And here it is this week: 

Tune in next week to see how it will look then...



All I'm saying is that I want my paintings to have a similar style and "feel", and to me it matters not how I accomplish that-- whether I paint it all out doors plein-aire, or all inside the studio, or a combination of both. 

I'm just trying to keep 'em real. 

Looking.


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Taking The Long Way Home

Theodore Roosevelt's favorite game to play with his five children was "Follow The Leader".   Teddy would take the children on a jaunt around their summer home on Long Island, but not by a nice, normal route.  No, Teds would take the kids through bogs, over walls, cutting through dense brush and weeds and fording small creeks.  What fun!  I can only imagine what post-traumatic stress went through their minds at the future mention of "follow the leader"...  (As a side note, TeeDee did the same as president, except instead of his children, he took his cabinet through a killer walk around a local park in Washington D.C.  What a card!).  I guess Teddy was the kind of guy to take the road less traveled.  Suffice it to say that he and I would not see eye to eye on that.  I'm not going to admit I'm lazy, but if you add up all the miles in my life, there's not a whole lotta extra ones.


Knowing my proclivity for calling it "good" a bit prematurely, one would think that my painting technique is a quick find-the-color-and-slap-it-on style. 

It is not.

I actually prefer the old fashioned traditional realism method of glazing.  That method involves a lot of patience which, not surprisingly, I was not blessed with an abundant reservoir.  So why do I do it?  Because I like the way glazing brings rich, deep colors with a jewel-like enamel surface.  I simply find it appealing.


Where my technique and personality clash is when I think a passage is good enough, but yet still doesn't have the finish that I like.  Now, most painters have the common flaw of not knowing when to quit.  Hell, I'm sure even Jackson Pollack has said to himself  "You know, maybe that's one drip too many..."  So I know it sounds crazy to say that I think my problem is I don't know when to keep going.  After all, isn't a painting all about how it looks?  And if it looks right, isn't it done?  But yet, I still am concerned about the "look" of the painting, if you know what I mean.


One more fly in the ointment:  I'm freakin' blind as a bat.  Well, actually, I'm far sighted.  That means I can spot a golf ball at three hundred yards, (someone else's, I don't hit 'em that far) but I struggle with seeing objects within eighteen inches.  It is a common enough malady with people my age, and fixed easily enough with glasses.  And I wear them.  Actually, I keep a different set at every place I may need to use them.  Well, that's the plan.  Usually after a day or two I wind up with four sets by the couch, and none near the computer where I now need  a pair.  But I digress...

So when I'm painting my tight little detailed passages, I think they look alright-- but that's only because I can't see them clearly.  So the path of least resistance is to leave it as-is.  The other route means to take a photo of the area, blow it up, and look at the results.  If it looks okay at that point, I can leave it alone and move on to the next passage.  If it doesn't, I keep going.  That means more work and more patience, more laborious steps before I can safely call it "good", but ultimately it's worth it.

It's the long way to go, but I think T.R. would have approved...

 

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Whinings

Sorry for my sparse blogging recently, but I've been as busy as a one-toothed beaver trying to finish some paintings to be scattered about.  I've also had some trouble with this blogger thing in that it's been difficult to upload photos.  I also have a new computer that I've been trying to get used to, but it hasn't been easy.  And my motto is: if it's not easy, why do it?

Well, here we are in March.  Now, for some, March is the first month of spring. 

Not in Maine. 

Here, March is the last month of winter.  But for some reason, the big eastern syndicate that controls the calendar has decided that every once in a while we need to prolong February before we start March.  Let me tell you:  February is the worst month of the year.  Cold.  Dark.  Cold.  Snowy.  And cold.  Why extend it?  I for one would be happy to have an extra day in June, wouldn't you?  How about an extra fourth of July?  You know, July 4th II.  Hell, I'd even take an extra day in September.  But February?  No thanks.

I'm not a paint-slapping kind of guy when I paint.  My glazing style isn't really messy, so I stay fairly neat when I'm working.  Except when it comes to Prussian Blue.  I don't know why, but whenever I'm near that damn color, it leaps off my palette and attacks my hands and clothes.  Any stain I have on my clothes is Prussian Blue.  I guess it could be worse, it could be Viridian.  That stuff's too damn expensive to waste!

I usually work on one project at a time.  I've never been much of a multi -tasker.  Heck, I remember my ex-wife used to give me a stick of gum for birth-control.  But I digress....

Anyway, recently I've been splitting my work day between two paintings.  One is a big painting shown at the top of this page which is about 70% done.  I work on that in the morning, and in the afternoon I work on this one:

 

I admit, the amount of detail I've put in this is insane.  But to tell the truth, I find it more fun to draw than paint.

A chore I do at the end of my working day is to stock the wood pile in the house by bringing it up from the garage.  When I was a teen living at home, my folks used wood heat because they'd be damned if they were going to pay 28 cents a gallon for heating oil!  My chore then was to split the wood by hand and stack it it to dry.  It was a job that had to be done in the summer so the wood would be dry by the winter.  It was a hot, sweaty, brutal chore, and I said to myself then that I'd be damned if I was going to use wood heat in my home!  Now, years later, I enjoy a nice fire in the woodstove, and it's better than using heating oil, but it is getting a little old lugging those logs around.

And thanks to this leap year, I get to do it for an extra day...

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Why?

As every three-year old knows, the beginning of every answer starts with the question, "Why?"

Why is the sky blue?

Why is there life on Earth?

Why was there a Porkies two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten?

(Answers below)

For painters, the same thing applies.  In my opinion, (which is how IMO looks spelled out) the key to making better paintings is asking "Why?"

Why is that sunset lovely?  Because the beautiful red, pink and gold colors reflecting off the puffy clouds are set against the robin's egg blue of the sky.

Why is that nude a beautiful sight?  Because of the way that shaft of sunlight streams across her bare breasts as she lays across a Victorian sofa.

Really, instead of just liking something enough to want to paint it, I think you have to dissect what it is you like about it.  For me, it's not enough to say, "Ooh, look at that lovely green tree in the meadow", I have to analyze why that tree is lovely to me.  I look at the color temperatures, the details, the contrast of light and darks.  If I can figure out why it's lovely, then I can incorporate that into my paintings.

But I also think that better painting comes from asking why you don't like something as well.  Like, why don't I like that car graveyard?  Because I don't find that pile of tires stacked around a rusted hulk of a car appealing.

Another Why? to consider is also the most difficult one: Why would anyone else like this? 


And therein lies the trouble.


The problem with creative types is that we can find something beautiful in everything;  "Ooh, look at that moist pile of dog poo lying next to that broken bottle!  Isn't the way the sun back-lights it and those buzzing flies just exquisite?  I must paint that!"  But why would anyone else want to see (and therefore buy) that painting?  I might find my aforementioned meadow a beautiful sight, but someone else might think it bland and uninspired.  A different painter (and collector) may just go wild about the pictorial possibilities of a pile of tires around a junked car.  But that difference is what makes the world go around, isn't it?  So when I ask myself why would anyone else like my picture, I just answer "because I do," and leave it at that.


I guess not every Why? has to have an answer.



Answers to the questions above:

1) Because that's what we named that color.

2) Because property values are better here.

3) Because the first nine left so many unanswered questions.


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