Recently I have been taking oil painting classes with Didier Nolet, a local landscape artist. I feel that I'm learning a great deal. In addition to technique, perhaps the most important thing I'm learning is how to see. I think that's the real difference between a professional and a beginner: the beginner still doesn't know what to focus in on. We so take for granted what our eyes see, and we don't know how to focus on the things that make a difference - the softness of a distant hillside, the coolness of the shaded lawn, the touch of pink in the reflected sky.
Technique is important, but it's only a part of the whole. I need to learn what to see.
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Versailles II - Garden of ZeusSunday, August 27, 2006
At Camiso
Oil on Canvas
I removed this painting because I felt that it was "anecdotal." The figure made it look like a snapshot (which it was - I copied a vacation snapshot taken at Camiso when we were visiting Bandelier). I now look for more emotional content in what I paint. At some point, most, if not all of these paintings will be removed - as more mature ones take their place.
Monday, August 21, 2006
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
What I do
I always thought I was a mis-directed writer - that writing was my greatest talent, and I should have been doing that all my life. But as a child, I was as much involved in drawing and painting as I was in writing. I recently realized that it's to painting that I should return. I made a deliberate decision when I was a teenager not to pursue the creative life - it seemed to me to be emotionally draining - possibly all the emotional ups and downs of being a teenager made me long for a more settled life - at any rate, I never pursued art. Now I get pleasure from the few sucesses I have - for example, if the water actually looks like water, or if the clouds actually look like couds. Yes, there are frustrations, but I am better able to take them in stride.
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