#11 Camille Corot 'The Rocky Stream' - 25 Days of Tonalism
Hello and welcome to Tonalist painting with M Francis McCarthy.
Today's painting is a study painted after Camille Corot - 'The Rocky Stream'.
Our video features the progression of this painting from its early underpainting stages on up through the final finishing brushwork. Also featured is my usual rambling narration, so please check it out.
On today's video, I was talking a bit about a discussion I heard recently featuring Tom Campbell. Tom is a physicist, philosopher and consciousness researcher. In this discussion, he was pointing out that in our daily choices there are thousands of potential wrong decisions that can be made and only a few good ones for each possible choice.
This got me thinking about landscape painting and how a painting is very similar. There are more ways to do a bad painting than a good one. Some of the ways that it is possible to fail are:
These are some of the ways to fail that come to mind readily. I'm sure I would find quite a few more if I really put my mind to it. This is one of the reasons that many teachers use negative qualities and 'don't do's' as their teaching approach.
If you avoid these potential issues your painting is probably going to be pretty good. For this reason, it's a lot easier to tell people what not to do sometimes than what it is they should be doing.
The fact is, (as a teacher) when you concentrate on telling people what they should be doing, you will often succeed only in creating clones of yourself since the aspiring painters are not being encouraged to find what is right for them. This is one reason why critiquing is a good way of helping student artists develop.
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about my study painted after Camille Corot - 'The Rocky Stream'; Camille got it right more than he got it wrong that's for sure and for this reason he is one of the all-time greats.
I learn a lot every time I do a study after his work and gain greater appreciation of him and his paintings as time progresses.
To see more of my work, visit my site here
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| Painted after - ' 'The Rocky Stream' by Camille Corot, Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x5, Oil on wood panel |
Our video features the progression of this painting from its early underpainting stages on up through the final finishing brushwork. Also featured is my usual rambling narration, so please check it out.
On today's video, I was talking a bit about a discussion I heard recently featuring Tom Campbell. Tom is a physicist, philosopher and consciousness researcher. In this discussion, he was pointing out that in our daily choices there are thousands of potential wrong decisions that can be made and only a few good ones for each possible choice.
This got me thinking about landscape painting and how a painting is very similar. There are more ways to do a bad painting than a good one. Some of the ways that it is possible to fail are:
- Bad composition.
- Odd or garish color choices.
- Areas of the painting that are inappropriately eye-catching.
- Poor draftsmanship.
- Muddy or inconsistent values.
- Too much or too little contrast.
- Insipid or cloying subject matter.
- Abstraction that does not come off well.
- Overreliance on an affected style.
- Boring scene selection.
- Ugly surface quality.
- Too much or too little texture.
These are some of the ways to fail that come to mind readily. I'm sure I would find quite a few more if I really put my mind to it. This is one of the reasons that many teachers use negative qualities and 'don't do's' as their teaching approach.
If you avoid these potential issues your painting is probably going to be pretty good. For this reason, it's a lot easier to tell people what not to do sometimes than what it is they should be doing.
The fact is, (as a teacher) when you concentrate on telling people what they should be doing, you will often succeed only in creating clones of yourself since the aspiring painters are not being encouraged to find what is right for them. This is one reason why critiquing is a good way of helping student artists develop.
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about my study painted after Camille Corot - 'The Rocky Stream'; Camille got it right more than he got it wrong that's for sure and for this reason he is one of the all-time greats.
I learn a lot every time I do a study after his work and gain greater appreciation of him and his paintings as time progresses.
To see more of my work, visit my site here
 |
| Original - Camille Corot - the Rocky Stream |
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| Study after - ' 'The Rocky Stream' by Camille Corot (Detail) |
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| Study after - ' 'The Rocky Stream' by Camille Corot (Detail 2) |