Day Thirty Five: Clouds after a Storm by Charles Harold Davis
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| Painted after - Clouds after a Storm by Charles Harold Davis, Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x5, Oil on wood panel |
Today's study is 'Clouds after a Storm' by Charles Harold Davis.
This is the second piece that we've done by Charles Harold Davis. It has been one of the more popular images in regards to people interested in buying the studies that I have produced in this series. The study that you are viewing today is the third iteration that I've done from his painting.
I will discuss some biographical information about Charles Harold Davis in today's video so if you want to learn more about him as an artist be sure to check that out.
Meanwhile I'm going to get my soapbox out so please stand back.
Today I'd like to discuss what the value of art actually is. Some might consider this to be a big can of worms to open. There are many people both involved with the arts, and not, that have strong opinions.
Any work of art is worth only what people are willing to pay for it. At least it's worth in currency is what people are going to pay for it. This figure will change dramatically depending on a lot of factors that actually have very little to do with the quality of the artwork involved. Factors such as whether the artist is alive or dead, how popular they were in their own lifetimes, what schools of art he/she was able to associate themselves with or, against and whether they went with the trends that were popular during their lifetime or whether they went counter to those same trends.
Artwork actually has two values, the first value is its intrinsic value as a work of art. This value would be determined by factors such as:
- How much the work moves the viewer.
- How beautiful or striking is the artwork.
- What sort of technical virtuosity was used in the creation of the artwork.
- How easy is it for another artist to do something similar.
There are many other factors that would also add to the intrinsic value of a work of art. These are just the ones that come to mind readily.
The financial/market value that can be assigned to a work of art involves different factors such as:
- How lucky was this artist at finding good representation and venues for the sales of their work,
- How much does a work correspond to the tastes and fashions of the era in which the artist is painting.
- What sort of stories can be generated around the artwork to involve the imagination of potential buyers.
- How much artwork did the artist generate? Are there only very few excellent works or, did the artist produce thousands of paintings of differing quality.
Both of these values are subjective. Just because they are subjective does not mean that an artwork does not have artistic value, In fact, art history can ultimately correctly judge the intrinsic value of a work of art. Especially after enough time has passed that fashion becomes unimportant. Also people can develop their own ability to accurately judge the artwork of their own time and of previous eras.
The idea that art has no intrinsic value of its own other than the ability it has to satisfy the needs of the marketplace was popular when I was young. The idea that there is no such thing as bad art was also popular. I strongly disagree with both of these notions. I think that some of the art that is lauded and sold for enormous sums of money these days is less than worthy. While at the same time works of exquisite genius go for pennies on the dollar.
I believe that if a work of art requires a salesperson to stand beside it and explain to you why it is worthwhile, desirable, should be purchased for a lot of money, then you're better off without that work of art in your collection. It would be far better to buy something beautiful that moves you regardless of "market" considerations.
Cheers,
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about 'Clouds after a Storm' by Charles Harold Davis, as I stated above this is the third study that I've completed of this painting. Clearly Charles was onto something with this image as people really respond to it.
Skies and clouds are my favorite things to paint and at times the landscape portion of my paintings function mostly as a support for the sky.
What is awesome about Charles painting is all the myriad striations of colors he used to compose it, it was fun to paint each time I executed a study and, I'm going to try and incorporate some of his sensibility into my work in the future.
To see more of my work, visit my site here.
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| Original painting, Clouds after a Storm by Charles Harold Davis |
Day Eleven: Clearing after a Storm by Charles Harold Davis
Hello and welcome to day eleven of 100 days of tonalism.
Painted after - Clearing after a Storm by Charles Harold Davis , Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x7, Oil on wood panel
Today's study is of 'Clearing after a Storm' by Charles Harold Davis .
Not your typical M Francis painting and that's one of the reason I did it. Charles Harold Davis had Tonalist tendencies but also worked in an Impressionist vein, yet with strong leanings towards a Barbizon approach. In other words he is a total hybrid and, in the case of Charles very successfully so. Here's link to a great page on Charles.
I was thinking today about what it means to be a contemporary landscape painter who is very influenced by the Landscape painting movements of the late Nineteenth century. It's not an easy stance to take. Doing the painting is the easiest part. It means answering a lot of questions I would not be asked if I painted in the current mode. Questions like: Why are you painting like this? Why are these painting so full of mood? What the heck is Tonalism?
As to the question of why paint this way?
The short answer is that it feels right to me. It feels authentic. The long answer or a portion of it is: art (in the form of painting here) is often regarded as evolving by art writers, and thus the general public. This same idea is often applied to music as well.
The truth is, this idea of evolution is only somewhat correct. While one can observe a progression in art through the ages of advances like, correct perspective and anatomy, after a certain level of perfection is reached, art is laid bare. At that point, great art comes from the soul and there is no evolution, just expression. I plan on discussing this idea further as this blog progresses. It occurred to me today, that this is as good a soapbox as any to express my opinions and ideas about painting and art in general.
Cheers,
M Francis McCarthy
A bit about 'Clearing after a Storm' by Charles Harold Davis. This one was fun and I knew it would be. I was attracted to the warm brown land and how it was so well offset by the big blue sky.
As I mentioned in the video, I made the barn in the original into a clump of trees. Sorry, not into painting barns and as I've stated before the point of these studies is to capture the essence of each original scene as I see it and to interpret that painting as a small study in my way of painting.
I see little point in making exact copies of any painting unless it's for purely educational purposes. In fact, there are dozens of sites happy to make you a copy of any painting in any size you like for a fairly reasonable amount of dosh. The reason these services can charge so little is that they employ legions of artists in China well trained in making these reproductions.
I wish I could set free these artists so that each of them could make their own unique art and present it to the world. I believe that in the future, much of humanity will be artists as the robots will have taken every other job. In fact I consider myself at the front of this future wave and I look forward to the day when all humanity is free to express their inner selves openly and at leisure!
To see more of my work, visit my site
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