Making a Mess in the Sunshine

A wonderful thing happened this week, we got a taste of Spring! When you live in a cool, wet, gray climate, the sun coming out to play for several days in a row is cause for celebration. Don't get me wrong, I love the climate here, but warm sunshine in February is a treat.
It also causes me to drop everything in the studio and head out with my plein air setup. I haven't done a lot of plein air painting. In fact, I could probably count the times I have been out on one hand plus an extra finger or two. I tried to get out more last year but I kept getting too cold. I would get caught up in painting and even though I had warm clothes on, wouldn't realize how cold I was until I finished and disengaged. I would be shivering uncontrollably all the way home. With this warm spell, the cold was not a problem. I headed out to my favorite spot, Hug Point.
Hug Point is a spectacularly beautiful spot where the Pacific Northwest forest meets the sea. The cliffs are water-carved sandstone and basalt. Quite dramatic. The only trick is, the tide has to be right to access it. I got to Hug Point just as it was possible to get around the first point. I had two hours until the tide turned. This particular area of Hug Point is dominated a waterfall cascading to the sand and tower of rock. The sun is lower this time of year and the rock glows golden. I placed my easel where I could see the ocean out of the corner of my eye and get a reasonable angle to paint. I never turn my back on the ocean. Sneaker waves, riptides, and floating trees are notorious around here and can and do take the occasional life.
I decided to concentrate on the color relationships and temperature for this oil sketch. I know that I am not up to painting a plein air masterpiece at this stage of my career! The warm winter sun brought out amazing colors in the rock. I made a glorious mess. I did take photographs so that I can do a few refinements in the studio but here is the mess I made:

Hug Point, plein air, oil on canvas 12"x12"

As you can probably tell, I concentrated mostly on the rock tower. The trees above the cliff I hastily suggested while eyeing the incoming tide. I really didn't want to get trapped there. There is a cave on the far left created by the ocean waves. Not a gentle place when the tide is full. Hug Point has a wonderful and interesting history that would make for a very long post. In short though, a bit further along is a road that was carved into the rock.  It used to be the only way to to get to where I live. Even before the road was carved there were (and still are) hand and foothold carved on the cliff by the First Nations people. One had to literally hug the point to cross. Needless to say there are stories of people, horses, and cars that were swept away by rising tides and, I suspect, sneaker waves. The road bed is covered with sea life such as large barnacles. I will post a picture of it another time. Here is a picture taken on a different day when it was gray and misty of the same area as the painting. My husband is standing on the foot of the rock. It gives a sense of scale that is not apparent in the painting.

Hug Point

I was painting from a completely different angle of course!
The final thing I have to show for this week is a sketch from today's life drawing session. I talked them into splitting a 40 minute pose into two 20 minute segments so that we could get a more dynamic pose that the model can hold.

Life Drawing, charcoal on newsprint 18"X24'

I wasn't entirely satisfied with the drawing. I felt it was still a bit too stiff.  I admit I am a bit out of practice. I have been working hard on so many other areas. I will get my skills back up to snuff soon.
I have errands and appointments tomorrow then I will be back at it in the studio...unless the sun decides to favor us with another day or two!
-Renee

Elizabeth Jane Gardner Bouguereau and Home Art School-Week 1

Philomena And Procne. Oil 24.49" X 31 1/2 ", Elizabeth Jane Gardner Bouguereau

One of my favorite art blogs is Matthew Innis' Underpaintings.When you have a bit of time I heartily recommend you check his blog out. I can easily spend hours looking at and thinking about all the art and links and information he puts up on his blog. The following information, however, doesn't come from his blog but was a link from his Facebook wall. It was a link to an article on The Forgotten Female Artists of the 19th Century, written in Epoch Times. The first name mentioned caught my eye as her husband William Adolphe Bouguereau's work is quite popular at this time. She is none other than Elizabeth Jane Gardner Bouguereau and an accomplished artist in her own right. Her work is definitely in the same manner as her husbands but has differences that are her own. To be honest, from what I have seen of her work, I prefer her paintings over her husband's. A bit more information on her can be found with the link I attached to her name. Some images of her work can also be viewed either by googling her name and clicking on "Images" or at the Art Renewal Center website here.
Her history, what is accounted for,  is a bit colorful as is many women artists of the past. Perhaps the particular challenges and difficulties that these women have had to face requires a certain strength of mind and willingness to bend conventions.
Elizabeth Jane Gardner Bouguereau had quite a few accomplishments in her own right but definitely stands in the shadow of her famous husband, with pride, I might add. She appeared to have embraced that criticism. With her accomplishments in what would today be considered art marketing, one has to wonder about her influence on her husbands career!
The painting at the beginning of this post is a wonderful sample of her work. I obtained the picture from the Art Renewal Center website linked above.
The first week of the third year of my own humble education went well. I spent a bit more time than I had anticipated getting things set up and in place but I did manage to keep to the schedule I made. It felt good. Still a bit daunting but I am thinking that it will work nicely. I worked on a color study and took a picture of the beginning color stage:

It has moved beyond this point as I took this at the beginning of the week. I also worked on my first self-portrait, in graphite on drawing paper. Yikes! It was a bit startling to me to study-with-the-intent-to-draw my own middle-aged face. I wasn't critical of the way I look, it was just that taking note of the changes that have happened over time was a bit disconcerting at first. I guess I really don't spend a lot of time looking at my face. I now have the beginnings of a recognizable self  image looking back at me from the paper. Perhaps I will get used to it in time as I will be using myself as a model for portrait work to get the basics down before luring others into my studio.
I also enjoyed working on a personal composition. I am in the planning and sketching stage. There are quite a few I would like to do but I am starting with a painting that includes a self portrait for some of the same reasons I have mentioned before. I figured I can always revisit the work when my skills improve and I will have the same model (albeit a bit older!).  The painting will also require another plein air trip just up the road so hopefully the weather and tides will cooperate soon.
Week 2 will be a busy one and hopefully will get a bit more done now that things are set up and in place. Thanks to the folks that have left comments, they are appreciated. Blogger still will not let me respond to them in each post and I have not had any response from Blogger to my inquiries.
On to week 2! -Renee

Progress and "Herstory"

I have been working away, honestly! I just didn't post last week. As I have mentioned before, this is taking me longer than I thought it would and it has been a  true learning experience. I thought about posting my progress last week but the painting was in a very awkward spot. So, here is the last picture I posted of the painting's progress:

 

And here is the latest:

I have got the first layer of color in on the whole painting. I am doing a little experimenting now and also going back over and refining forms and color. I would like to think that I will be stopping once I have done another go through. This is supposed to be a study, not a masterpiece. I really am anxious to move on. It has allowed me time to think things through though. I have been thinking how to continue my studies and what direction I want to go. I do have a final goal. I want to acquire the level of skills I need to be able to paint anything I want to depict. The skills will always be added to even when I am satisfied that I have reached my goal. 

I am not going to say anything more at this time. I will wrap up my thoughts when the final picture is posted on this painting. 

In the meantime, I came across an interesting comment on an article about women artists and why they are not proportionally represented in our society compared to male artists. It isn't for lack of female artists as many articles report that the number of women graduating from art programs are greater than the number of men, yet only a small percentage are represented in galleries, art shows, and museums. I would add trade magazines and books to that list! I am not going to talk about the actual numbers here as there are more informed resources out there. The comment that caught my eye was actually a challenge. It pointed out that even female artists who blog often have long lists of male artists they admire and few, if any, female artists. The comment is a challenge for us women to start finding and exposing others to the many female artists both past and present that are out there. 

I have been thinking along those lines for quite a while, even before I started this blog. There is a huge gap in our art history courses when it comes to women artists. As the documentary "Who Does She Think She Is?" mentions, the person on the street is hard pressed to name even five women artists. I have been studying on my own and am starting to find more and more remarkable and overlooked women in the arts in our history. I decided to add a little variety to my blog by featuring a female artist, if not every post, frequently. I am going to start out with women from our past history, or herstory. As this post is plenty long, I will be starting these posts next week. In the meantime, in the "Artists Who Inspire" sidebar on this blog, you will also find many links to contemporary female artists. Yes, there are a few men too!

Finally, today is Memorial Day here in the U.S.A. I want to send thoughts of gratitude to the women and men of our armed forces and their families. I also want to acknowledge all the wonderful service and rescue animals who are also heroes in their own right.

-Renee

Let the Color Begin

The color is slowly trickling into the painting. I am having a lot of fun too! I do love to experiment and I enjoyed spending time playing with every combination of every red and blue on my palette to get the colors in the fabric. Well, almost every combination. I did try to keep the color temperatures separate so that I had a nice range of cool purples and warm purples to play with. I am slowly darkening the background and am still getting the first layer of color over the entire painting.
I must admit this painting is a little more involved than I had intended. In addition, the progress has been slow  because I also work on studies both in painting and drawing to continue to build my skills. I will be working on several short color study/still lifes that are much simpler. The studies are pretty mundane but I will post a few of them next week as part of my purpose with this blog is to show the progression of a beginning artist. I want to show that an artist must build skills as much as any other profession. So many people I talk to assume that art is a talent that one is born with. Ha! Talk to a well established, seasoned, successful artist and they will be the first to tell you that it takes blood, sweat, and tears, not to mention endless practice. Of course, all of that work is deeply joyful and highly satisfying. It has been so far for me.
The studies I do such as gesture sketches over and over are like practicing scales on a piano or any other musical instrument. Not glamorous but necessary for true mastery.
Today I spent a dark and stormy morning at the local life drawing session. Not a bad way to pass the time!
We have some beloved guests coming on Friday to spend a few days with us. I am hoping to have my friend hold a few poses that I can recreate with my manikin in addition to a few quick gesture sketches. I am also expecting an early birthday present that will be a big help in getting around with my plein air easel and sketchbook. If it arrives in time, I will have some fun pictures to show.
Here is hoping that Spring will show her beautiful warm face soon!
-Renee

One Day I Will Laugh!

You have to let yourself giggle at your first attempts at just about anything. There are exceptions of course but when creating or learning anything new, a sense of humor is necessary. So, what am I chortling about lately? My very first attempt to paint with color. Here it is, still in progress:

Is it going well? Well, it isn't a total disaster. Am I learning a lot? You better believe it! The colors are close but not spot on. I took this picture in a totally different light situation than what I am using to paint with so it would be very hard to tell from this picture exactly what is going on but the general idea is there. I am enjoying myself tremendously, even when I get tangled up in frustration. I know I will get to where I want to go. I will be keeping this study. I want to pull it out one day a few years from now so I can see just how far I have gone. What I want to paint is so very complex compared to this but the simplification is necessary at this point. In fact, this needs to be simplified even more as I am still learning how to put the paint on the canvas let alone the color and all the other complex stuff. I am so very glad I have spent the past year drawing intensively.
I am still drawing, both figure drawing and cast drawing. I have set up a cast to work on in fact, and here it is along with a view of a cramped studio. It is cramped but it works just fine. I can move around almost as much as I need to and I can leave things set up.

 

I am working on the mouth of David. I have been alternating between a day of painting and a day of drawing. So far it seems to be working just fine. 

Yesterday we had a break between storms and the day was wonderfully sunny but chilly. We decided to drive 5 minutes up the road to the state park on the north end of our town and hiked a short path in to Short Sands Beach. It is a local surfing spot and breathtakingly beautiful. My husband took a picture of me, with our faithful dog Twill, sketching waves. 

Twill is actually lying on a blanket over flat rocks. We were there at high tide so there wasn't much sand but the beach got bigger as the tide went out. The sun felt wonderful and I was eventually able to take my coat off. 

This week we will be taking a day off to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday here in the U.S. I have a lot to be thankful for and will be enjoying a modest meal with my loved ones in quiet celebration. 

So what am I thankful for? I am thankful for good health, the abundance in my life, family, friends, and the freedom to choose. 

Wishing everyone the same, 

-Renee