We had another very successful evening of good art, conversation and critiques.
We started with my Still-Life tribute the Renoir’s nude. This painting is now finished and I was looking forward to some input from the group. The discussion was very encouraging; there were no suggestion of necessary chances or dislikes. The group was particularly impressed with the detail in the flowers and the feeling of depth in the background objects. I spent a lot of time rendering a color relationship between the Renoir photograph figure and the left side leaves; I’m interested in sustaining a dialog between the two objects, and that did not go without notice.
This painting is finished, so two more to go to finish off the series.
Donna brought a large drawing of Devil’s Postpile which is still in progress. We collectively agreed that this drawing, like the previous one, has tremendous potential. The under-drawing is complete and the overdrawing is beginning to define the objects better. The drawing has a very strong rhythmic quality due the vertical rock formations; thinner more delicate rocks have a very high visual key where the broader more robust vertical rocks have a slower lower key feeling. I thought one should be cautious about the tree line cutting the drawing in half between the vertical rocks above and the broken rocks below, so I suggested some techniques regarding passage such as placing some rocks within the trees. There was also some discussion about keeping the colors in balance and paying particularly close attention to values that could enhance the motif.
It will be interesting to see the development and progress in the piece at future critiques.
Thom has been very prolific lately and brought in a bunch of work. For brevity I placed two of them in the blog.
The first was another painting of Linda’s that Thom is finishing. This is a very sweat painting and has a lot of merit to the development of the subject. The color scheme is very attractive and adds a sense of calm and focus to the motif. We felt that some of the drawing of the hands needs to be better defined and the structure in the back (an opened book) doesn’t necessarily read as a book. There seems to be a lack of definition on the left hand and the fingers seemed large in respect to the face. We suggested reducing the emphasis on the background book; this would help the figure stand out, but changes to the face should not be made; it was quite wonderful.
The second piece, I thought, was more identifiably Thom. It is an interesting hieroglyph of a domineering female figure, a subordinate male figure and two groups of figures on a concave and convex arc. Thom agreed that there is a lot of work that still needs to be done on this painting. The dominate female is the most resolved object and has some very interesting cubist features. The groups of figures are the least resolved and need work to either push it further into the background or flatten it into the forward space as a hieroglyph would do; currently it is a bit indecisive and ambiguous. Suggestions circled around the drawing and rendering nature of the people and not on any color or tonal qualities. This would have been too premature in its development to add any comments.
This painting is the perfect vehicle for what we are trying to do here, help each other grow in our work as a community of Artist with the goal of enhancing the experience and results of art making.
Hope you enjoyed reading this overview and look forward to any comments you might have.
Ron
That was a great synopsis of our meeting Ron! You seem to be very thoughtful and accurate regarding what was said and talked about in the meeting. Perhaps you have a future career as an art critic! Just kidding! I would never suggest to an artist that they pursue anything but their art!
Both of the images I sent for your blog are a bit darker than actual, but your analysis and comments are right on. Painting hands (and figures) realistically is not my bailiwick, but for this collaboration I am trying to get it right. The surreal setting for “Linda Reading”was a solution to a difficult horizontal format.