Painting - Expression
Expression is what fuels all art. Expression should be and is the purpose for even creating art at all.
Sometimes the intellect can cause us to choke a lot of the expression out of a painting. I'm speaking from lot's of direct experience...
Though I am an artistic type, I am also very rational and like to plan things out. I always say " I'm all for spontaneity... as long as it's planed."
That's my own struggle to work with as an artist. Yours may be different. You may be super expressive with your art but lazy in regards to craft or unmindful of other critical aspects of your work that are out of sync.
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| "Headed Home" by M Francis McCarthy |
A challenge for many of us as artists is the attainment of skill and craft without the calcification that can sometimes be the result of applying too much craft.
Like every other aspect of our lives a balance must be struck between control and passion. Ultimately, passion/expression is the most critical of the two. Art without unique individual expression is boring as hell.
I feel that we must paint from our heart and that direction from the intellect should be at a subsurface type level for the most part.
To consistently create good work and still do this,"craft" must become ingrained deep into the psyche. The only way I know of to do this is to paint and draw a lot until those skills become second nature.
What else can we do to increase the expressive qualities of our paintings?
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| "Headed Home" (sketch) by M Francis McCarthy |
What else can we do to increase the expressive qualities of our paintings?
Here's a short list:
- Do some random stuff to you painting now and again. Then, deal with it.
- If you start with a photo, put it away at some point and focus on the painting, as a painting.
- Paint slower, let it well up inside you then express the brush stroke fully.
- Remind yourself while your painting that expression is your main goal and measure each aspect of your work against this. This is very useful for instigating creative color decisions.
- Remember, you don't have to paint the sky blue and the grass green. In fact that's about the worst color combination I can think of in a landscape painting.
- Do not over delineate details. Leave something for the viewer to do. They are quite capable of creating meaning from even the daubiest daub.
Rember, paint from the herat and not the head. Train yourself to get those skills that you may then ignore.
A bit about today's painting "Heading Home" I' pretty happy with heading home but I see much I'd do differently now. I painted this about a year and a half ago after moving into my studio at the Quarry Art Center in Whangarei. I like the colors and loose-ish brush work.
These days I and transitioning from a more controlled drawing prior to painting into a more expressive and indicative mode in my execution. Stay tuned.
Cheers,
Landscape Painting - Craft
Oil painting is a craft. Like carving , clay working, writing a sonnet or any other activity one has to work at mastering. One of the reasons I write this blog is to support and further the craft of Painting.
Does this mean that painting isn't one of the highest of arts?
Definitely not. Only movies and music have an equal power to move us to great emotion. A painting can grab you and before you know it you're ensconced in it's reality, transported to another space, way of being, or seeing.
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| "Passing Storm" (8x10) by M Francis McCarthy |
For an artist to achieve even a fraction of the potential natively inherent in the form of painting, requires true diligence. Hours of work and study must be expended. The only fuel that can sustain an effort of this magnitude is passion.
Minimal effort will yield shallow results at best. You may be a hobbyist or perhaps just an art explorer. No worries mate, that's fine. If painting is anything it's fun. Or should be. Not every thing we do in our lives has to be considered work.
Oil painting is my work though and I do it every day for 4 to 6 hours. By that I mean actual brush on board painting. I cannot say I've always approached my painting so consistently. When I first got to New Zealand I was coming off 27 years of full-time labor. I needed a break and I had a great time. Now I'm hitting it hard as..
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| "Passing Storm" (5x7) by M Francis McCarthy |
Oil painting is my work though and I do it every day for 4 to 6 hours. By that I mean actual brush on board painting. I cannot say I've always approached my painting so consistently. When I first got to New Zealand I was coming off 27 years of full-time labor. I needed a break and I had a great time. Now I'm hitting it hard as..
Examples of the great craft and art of Landscape Painting are easy to find. As are tutorials and instruction geared towards the nuts and bolts craft of creating oil paintings on canvas or board.
You tube alone is a vast resource. Seeing painting as a craft is a great way to improve and also keeps you from falling in to the amateur/layperson trap of thinking any old crap can equal art.
BTW Even good abstract work exhibits craft so don't think of abstract art as an escape route (for the lazy though, many do think that way).
Look at your work. Does it stand up as something solid? Will it support the weight of repeated viewing by the interested and disinterested? Even if you are a hobbyist working on your stuff only part time, you can bring the pride of doing something well, to what you do.
It might mean watching one less TV show or spending more on art supplies than you'd rather. Ultimately this world only pays back if some effort has been extended.
About today's painting "Passing Storm": I painted this last year and though I've sold the 5x7 I still have the larger painting in my studio.
This ones all about the sky and I enjoyed painting the clouds in freely in both paintings. Also I wanted to contrast the cool grayish sky against the warm rusts and golds of late summer grass.
About today's painting "Passing Storm": I painted this last year and though I've sold the 5x7 I still have the larger painting in my studio.
This ones all about the sky and I enjoyed painting the clouds in freely in both paintings. Also I wanted to contrast the cool grayish sky against the warm rusts and golds of late summer grass.
Cheers,
Inspiration - Past, Present, Future
Every artist must face their own best work. Whether their previous artistic highs inspire or torment them is one of the greatest factors in determining their success as artists. I have seen many friends and even other professional artists hit this particular block.
As for me, I am always aware of my previous work and I like to keep the best of it around to contemplate and appreciate. That said, I try to wear my work lightly. Ultimately I feel that good art is an expression of not just the artist alone, but of the Universe itself.
When one recons with the effort and different elements that must go into even a bad work of art, the mind boggles at the complexity of creating a high, artistic achievement.
I've written in the past about artistic blocks. The best way to eliminate blocks is to keep your breaks from creating art, brief. In other words, you should be making art all the time. Inspiration does show up for those that are actively pursuing their vision as an artist.
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| By the Brook (12x18) by M Francis McCarthy |
I've written in the past about artistic blocks. The best way to eliminate blocks is to keep your breaks from creating art, brief. In other words, you should be making art all the time. Inspiration does show up for those that are actively pursuing their vision as an artist.
There is many a talented artist that is unable to produce consistently high quality work. For the most part these poor folks are laboring under a certain type of belief in "inspiration". Their belief? That inspiration always strikes the artist like a bolt from the heavens, compelling them to rise off their bottoms to engage with their waiting easels and finally create that masterpiece.
Sure, we've all had an experience similar to the example above. The truth is that those sort of inspired moments happen most frequently in the early part of our artistic journey. As an artist progresses and creates a body of work, they taper off. What replaces these "lightning strikes" as the artist matures?
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| By the Brook (5x7) by M Francis McCarthy |
The answer for me is that I see inspiration as a collaboration between myself and the Universe. I have a desire to create beauty and I conspire with the universe to do so. I feel a "flow" well up from within. This feels natural like breathing. Creation should feel like that. Like a natural occurrence, like eating or breathing. Something you can do, something you must do.
Ideally, just like breathing you let your work come and go, ebb and flow, unselfconsciously. Expressing easily and naturally in the moment.
In closing, look at and learn from your best work and also the best work of other artists that may be doing things that you admire.
However, always keep your reflections positive. Fear and art are a bad combination. Nature favors the brave.
So, be present with the art you're doing now and make art a flow in your life, not a stop, start and struggle. I've more to say on this topic in future posts. Enough philosophical rambling for one day.
Landscape Painting - Revisting a Theme
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| Creek Reflections (6x9) by M Francis McCarthy |
I'm fond of this older 6x9 painting. It was painted on a maple panel that I textured with gesso. I was freshly under the spell of Tonalism and this panting reflects that. It has been painted with thousands of tiny strokes and is very diffused. It took me awhile to develop my brushwork so that is is diffuse yet articulated.
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| Creek Reflections (8x12) by M Francis McCarthy |
When seen reduced like this the newer "Creek Reflection" seems as diffuse as his smaller brother. Here's a detail.
Is it better? Just different really, both are nice paintings. I prefer the brushwork in the newer image though because it has character while still being somewhat diffuse.
Re the color shift between the two versions, that's more a function of my Tonalist re-expression of the theme.
I decided that for this painting that I wanted to eliminate blue from my pallet and used black as a blue substitute.
While this may seem odd to modern artistic intentions, artists prior to the late 1800's had scant access to blue pigments. It wasn't until the invention and marketing to artists of synthetic ultramarine blue that artists could really use blue as we do today.
Prior to this, natural blue pigments were very expensive and hard to grind. As a result many artists used black as a blue. It actually works well as lead white and ivory black make a cool grey.
I enjoy painting the same subjects more than once. I will usually investigate a new avenue rather than a direct copy. Copying a smaller piece up to a lager size can be rewarding but it's not as fun or artistic.
This touches on another topic though which I've been thinking of writing about. That is how we as artists perceive our work and ourselves in comparison to past work and accomplishments. A philosophical topic I'll get into tomorrow...
Inspiration
I enjoy talking with the many artists that visit my studio at the Quarry Arts Center here in Whangarei. Today I was chatting with someone about Inspiration. Actually the topic of artist blocks came up but I prefer to couch this phenomenon in the positive context of Inspiration vs the negative attribute of "artists block".
There are many causes of artists block. Here's list off the top of my head:
- Not enough work being created
- Not enough time spent doing art
- Too much comparison with past work or the work of others
- Lack of desire to create art
- A bad attitude about one's art or abilities
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| California Hills (6x9) by M Francis McCarthy |
Now lets start reworking the bad attitude by rewording "artists block" to "seeking inspiration". One simple change like that can completely re-frame the issue. There is a lot more positive changes that can and will eliminate any artists block.
Here's some great ways to find inspiration:
- Work more, talk less. Inspiration shows up for those who are working and avoids those who prefer talking about working or work they've done in the past.
- Pick a style and master it before moving on. This is all about focus which I'll talk more about in a future post.
- Emulate the work of artists you admire. By this I mean teach yourself whats good about their work that touches you as an artist. I am not saying that you should ever try to assume the style and working methods of another artist as your own. What I am saying is that the best way to learn how to do something is to try to recreate that which moves you.
- Give yourself a break. If you're truly working hard at your art, your stuff cannot stay bad for long. Hard work always pays off. Always. So don't be too self critical while you're developing as an artist. That's not to say you shouldn't be critical of your work. You should be creating enough of a flow of art that no one piece is all that important anyway.
- Destroy you worst work. You don't need it around if it sucks. If you are really working as hard as you should be, you'd have so much art sitting around that you won't mind getting rid of the crap.
- Do more pieces that take less time. If you have to, work smaller. Smaller works take less time generally speaking and this allows you to cover more ground while mastering your craft.
A bit about today's painting California Hills. I painted this back in 2009. It's maybe my third or forth painting in a Tonalist vein.
I was working on textured panels at the time and I still do my 5x7s oil sketches on textured boards. These days I prefer to do my final paintings on a regular wood surface. The type of wood does matter and I really like hard woods. Here in New Zealand I use kauri which has a nice tight even wood grain.
Be Passionate
In my last post I mentioned that you should create beauty even if no one cares. This is the attitude that any artist worth his salt must have.
Art is all about passion. Passion in regards to art is a decision that's made by the artist to fully engage with the imagination. Imagination is the energy that creates and sustains our personal and collective realities.
Everyday we are immersed in the creative imagination of our fellow human beings in a mostly unconscious way. Passion allows us to also become a creator in this world, not just a spectator.
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| Evening Shadows by M Francis McCarthy |
Passion is required to sustain any artist through the effort of attaining mastery. I heard a quote once that went "a plague on easy masterpieces" unfortunately I cannot locate the source but it's meaning has resonated with me my whole life. That which comes easy in not usually worth attaining.
To paint well for example requires years of study and practice. There is no easy way to do it other than just rolling up your sleeves and getting to work. I've heard another artist say that it was the equivalent of learning to play concert violin and I agree.
Without passion there is no way you could spend the time required to get good at anything. If you're following this blog and want to paint well, my advise is to get passionate, right now! Get those paints out and paint as much as you can whenever you can. results will come rapidly.
Today's picture Evenings Shadows was painted last year and can be viewed at the Yvonne Rust Gallery in the Quarry arts center, Whangarei.
Why paint?
I have been creating art for 42 years. In that time, I have worked with many different medias. For a long time I was content to use pencil and pen ink to create drawings. The mastery of rendering form in light and shade was for quite a while enough.
With the advent of the computer I began applying colour to my art work in both in the virtual realm and from without. The freedom that I felt working in the virtual world was incredible! I could change anything I wanted at any time. I could also add and remove things at will. It was amazing, a revelation really...
For many years I utilized the skills that I'd learned in creating artwork on the computer to make a living as a graphic illustrator. I found this work to be quite engaging and fulfilling for a time. However, I eventually began to feel a yearning for a deeper connection with my art and it's apprehenders. This desire is what eventually drove me to study painting in oil.
When I first started painting in oils in 2007 I found that many of the skills that I had acquired through a lifetime of creating artwork were applicable in this medium. I also learned that many of the things that work for me in the virtual realm did not work well when I was creating artwork by hand using oil paints and a hardwood substrate.
While creating an actual physical painting I am aware that a transference occurs. It seems this is a transference of energy and consciousness between myself the painting and the apprehender of the painting. Speaking only for myself I do not find this occurs when creating artwork digitally and printing it out. As far as I know this phenomenon exists only with original artworks being viewed by a person in the presence of the original art .
This is a fascinating and rewarding endeavour and is an interesting reason to paint as well. There are more reasons to paint of course and perhaps we will go further into those in future blog posts.
For many years I utilized the skills that I'd learned in creating artwork on the computer to make a living as a graphic illustrator. I found this work to be quite engaging and fulfilling for a time. However, I eventually began to feel a yearning for a deeper connection with my art and it's apprehenders. This desire is what eventually drove me to study painting in oil.
When I first started painting in oils in 2007 I found that many of the skills that I had acquired through a lifetime of creating artwork were applicable in this medium. I also learned that many of the things that work for me in the virtual realm did not work well when I was creating artwork by hand using oil paints and a hardwood substrate.
While creating an actual physical painting I am aware that a transference occurs. It seems this is a transference of energy and consciousness between myself the painting and the apprehender of the painting. Speaking only for myself I do not find this occurs when creating artwork digitally and printing it out. As far as I know this phenomenon exists only with original artworks being viewed by a person in the presence of the original art .
This is a fascinating and rewarding endeavour and is an interesting reason to paint as well. There are more reasons to paint of course and perhaps we will go further into those in future blog posts.