Blog

In our journey as artists we spend a long time learning how to render. We focus on drawing, values, edges, and color and eventually learn how to paint a decent head, or vase or figure.  However, we often paint the subject in isolation; the “background” is almost an after thought. In essence, we create a “study,” but many artists never make the leap to creating a finished, complete painting.  Masters like Sargent and Sorolla painted hundreds of studies but as preparation for the masterworks we admire in the top art museums. 

So what’s the distinction?

A study is concerned with likeness, and rendering. A painting is concerned with meaning, narrative, relationship, and emotion. In a study the subject is paramount, the background relatively trivial. In a painting the “background” is essential. It provides context and narrative.  In the study the focus is on depicting a person or object.  In the painting, the overall composition (distribution of light and dark shapes) is crucial. Every square inch of the painting is important.

How do we get from here to there?

In the 19th century advanced students at the Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris or the Repin Institute in Russia were expected to create large, complex, narrative paintings. They worked under the guidance and advice of their professors. Nowadays, such rigorous training is largely absent. (There are a few notable exceptions such as the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, the Florence Academy, and the increasing number of representational ateliers that have been founded over the past two decades.)

There are also a few workshops that focus on creating more finished paintings. (I’m teaching one in my studio in early May.)https://schneiderart.com/workshop/14657/beginning-to-end-making-a-large-studio-painting But many artists are left to make the leap on their own.

If you fall into the do-it-yourself camp, expect to spend a lot of time and effort learning this element of our craft. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to think! As the master illustrator Andrew Loomis wrote, “All creativity is in the planning. The rest is just good carpentry.”

We need to train ourselves to think like a filmmaker. As you plan ask yourself the crucial questions: who is the subject? What is happening? When? Where is the scene taking place? Why? 

Once you start to formulate a concept, how will you depict it? There’s a dramatic way to portray any situation, it’s up to us to figure it out. Should the painting be in a high or low key? Will the setting “tell the tale” or will it be the model’s expression or body language? What accessories do you need? How should the models be dressed? Use sketches and “roughs” to work out the concept. (Hint the first idea is usually not the best idea.) When you’ve worked out a good idea then set it up, hire models and go for it…don’t try to make it up 

I suspect that many artists are in such a hurry to get to the “fun” part that we skip the requisite planning. Here are some of the studies that Sargent used to prepare for his masterwork, “The Oyster Gatherers of Cancale.”

One of the challenges we face as artists has to do with the way the human brain works. We filter out the commonplace while focusing on the new or unusual. (Evolutionarily speaking -- Ignore the wind rustling the leaves; pay attention to the saber-tooth tiger coming through the meadow.) 

This filtering means that any error we leave on our canvas for 10 or 15 minutes becomes invisible to us… until the next day!  It’s not that the “evil painting trolls” come out at night and attack our paintings. It’s just that it takes a fresh eye to make the flaws obvious. 

Here are some good painting practices that can help:

• Squint at your subject to simplify value and edge relationships…it helps to see the big picture.

• Step back frequently.

• Have a mental checklist. (How’s the alignment? Is the drawing OK? How about values? Are the temperature relationships correct? Do the edges range from razor sharp to completely lost?)

• Use a mirror to see your piece reversed (a great way to spot alignment problems).

• Use a black mirror above your eyes to see the image inverted.

• Take a photo on your smart phone.  Sometimes just seeing a small version of the painting is all we need.

• Use a program like Value Viewer, to gain a new perspective.

One of the most helpful things I learned was to ask others to critique my work. If you can get input from a master artist, great! But a spouse, friend, or even a non-artist can tell you if something’s not working. It’s much easier to see problems in others’ work then in our own. Hint: Don’t get defensive! Thank them for the input and then decide for yourself if you need to act on the advice.  Here are some "before" and after images in response to well-founded criticism.

Good instruction helps with all of the above. It can show us our blind spots, give us ways to correct the flaws, and teach us principles to organize our thinking (a road map.) Perhaps, most importantly, it can sensitize us to habitual errors. For example, I have a tendency to make the iris of the eye too large. This leads to enlarging the eye and then the space between seems too small. One small initial error causes the whole painting to rapidly spin out of control. Just knowing what to watch out for is invaluable!