This was the demonstration painting for the class I taught last Saturday. I asked everyone to work from a drawing. I chose one I did last year in California. After walking on the bluff above the ocean, I came indoors and did a sketch imagining the cliffs from out in the water. I believe when I draw my subject first, there is often more insight and understanding of it when I begin to paint.
This coming Saturday we`re going to work from something actual, like a flower or some other still life. We all have great cameras in our pockets with our smart phones. I`m very grateful for this but there is a real risk we won`t slow down enough to closely study something.
watermedia on paper 20"x16"
available work in my studio
2 comments:
When putting the camera between the subject and the viewer, there's not only the loss on intimacy that comes with close inspection of details; one fails to commit the subject to the mind's eye and memory. The subject becomes the camera's and not one's own.
I like the idea of drawing the subject first, because that's mark-making, sometimes intuitive, sometimes less so, but it comes out of the act of seeing that then is translated through the hand; again, achieving a kind of intimacy with subject that otherwise would not exist.
Exactly Maureen!
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