Umbrellas

Over the years umbrellas have featured in quite a few of my paintings, whether similar to Friday's post or otherwise. You see a lot of umbrellas in a city, whether the weather is wet or not. Sometimes umbrellas are for shade, not protection from rain or sleet. In the last post, "Goodbye" had a lot of them. 

"The Pink Umbrella," oil, 10x8

Here are three "umbrella paintings," as I sometimes call them. In each the weather is different and so the effects needed are different. "The Pink Umbrella" is a rainy day painting, complete with smeared colors, watery surfaces and muted reflections. It was the high point of view that attracted me to this particular composition, but as always the rainy day was attractive as well. 

In "Sabrett" the weather is dry and sunny but our point of view is the deep shade of tall buildings. The composition was mostly abstracted, except the figure and the two umbrellas over his hot dog cart. A relatively narrow range of values helped make the muted colors more realistic. 

Finally, in "Union Square, Winter," the weather is entirely inclement--a blizzard in fact. The blowing snow obscures everything beyond the middle distance, even the light from streetlamps. Distant buildings are mere blue shapes in the white wall of snow.

"Sabrett," oil on panel, 9x12

I suppose you can lump these together as pictures containing an umbrella, but they're also quite different from one another.

"Union Square, Winter," oil on panel, 10x8

Rainy Scenes

Some years ago, rainy weather fascinated me as a painter. When the skies go grey and misty and the light becomes flat and shadowless, when rain falls steadily, the scene is ripe for more drama than a sunny day.

Hoff, "Goodbye," oil on panel, 2009

In a city, in the rain, things begin to look smeared. Buildings, pavement, streetlights, even faces lose definition. The world turns into shades and tints and lights shimmer and float. "Goodbye" developed from a city sketch of pedestrians in the rain. Here and there, the shiny pavement reflected shop lights onto the people hurrying along in the downpour. For me the composition is more effective for lacking a definite horizon, suggesting the complexity of city streets and intersections. 

Still Life

Diego Velazquez, "Old Woman Frying Eggs," 1619. A bodegon.

Like most, a great deal of my work once was still life. A still life is simply a drawing or other image of a group of inanimate objects. It doesn't matter if they once were animate; they are not at the moment they're caught in the image. Certain paintings that do contain an animate object are also considered still life--an example is the Spanish bodegon or kitchen painting, that often has a figure or two. But usually when we think of still life we think of the inanimate.

Still life is a great way for beginners to work because everything can be arranged, not just the objects themselves but their lighting and surroundings. Many painters have some kind of light box with three sides that can be set up rather in the way movies are set up. The painter can juxtapose green apples, red peppers, an orange, and a glass of water, for example, in a pleasing arrangement and paint the result. Contemporary painters do just that, but in the past the idea wasn't simply to show a pleasing arrangement or show one's technical skills. 

Hoff, "Risk Factors," oil on panel, 2008

From the 16th century into our own time, still lifes have served as metaphors. One important type of still life is the vanitas, a reminder of our universal mortality. Vanitas refers to a phrase from Ecclesiastes "vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas"--that is, "vanity of vanities, all is vanity." Vanitas paintings often include symbols of transience such as soap bubbles, a skull, a snuffed candle. Other kinds of still life have show opulent spreads of food and drink--known as "breakfast paintings" in Holland at that time. Even these sumptuous, rather decadent images contain hidden meanings. 

Rembrandt, "Side of Beef," oil on panel, 1655

 

 

 

 

Some still life isn't easily classified. For example, Rembrandt's "Slaughtered Ox," now in the Louvre, does show a inanimate object, this time a side of beef in a slaughterhouse. The painting is relatively small but has an enormous impact. It is indeed classified as a still life, but carries an implicit message about life and its transience. Why the great Dutch painter made this painting remains unknown, but it has inspired others--notably Chaim Soutine and Francis Bacon.

Hoff, "Onion," oil on panel, 2011

Still life is clearly more than a collection of objects. But sometimes that's all it is. Many beginning painters have tackled the subject of a ripe apple, or a pear, or a glass of wine, or even all three in the same painting. For practice a good idea is to include objects that echo solid geometric shapes--spheres, cylinders, cubes and similar solids, pyramids, and so on. 

 

Hoff, "Bedtime Snack," oil on panel, 2006

One great way to build momentum in the studio is to do small, daily studies of various objects like that apple (left), or perhaps a glass of milk (below). The daily painting habit plus the use of small support sizes means that you can practice without worrying over time and expense or getting to precious about each individual work. 

For anyone who wants to advance skills in all phases of painting or drawing, give daily still life painting a try.

Plein Air at Last

After waiting and longing for plein air work for three or four months spring weather has at last allowed me some time outdoors. During the past week sun and warmth predominated over grey skies and damp, so that I was able to get outside with my Open BoxM and actually do some oil painting. It isn't that there haven't been outdoor opportunities, of course. The Saturday group goes out weekly, rain or shine, and I've had a few outings with them, as far back as March. But watercolor and oil paint are quite different. Watercolor is quick, portable, transparent and oil paint is slower in execution and drying, semi-opaque and considerably less easy to transport. 

I finished a single plein air oil this week, 9x12 on panel, completed on the spot. The Raccoon River is nearly always a slow, lazy stream colored a warm brown-green by silt from farmland upstream. Because it's so near it's one of my favorite subjects. 

"Raccoon Bend," oil on panel, 9x12

It is a certainty that this summer and fall I'll be spending more time on the river bank.

A Spring Sketch

The spring season is at last more like spring and less like either fall or summer. The temperatures have moderated, spring storms are lessening, and trees and gardens are in flower. Near us is an arboretum with several dozen flowering trees. Blazing temperatures forced the trees into massive flower, but the high temperatures were threatening, so last Thursday a handful of mates from the Saturday sketch group made our way to the arboretum for a painting session. Although I could have used oils, I had already spent several hours working en plein air and wanted to switch gears so I used watercolor. 

"In the Arboretum," watercolor and ink on paper, 5x10

The day was pleasant, with a little south breeze and fair skies. I laid in the composition lightly in pencil, then painted broad color washes, becoming progressively more detailed. A technical pen made adding the ink lines simple, at the end.

Ink

Like most people, I first learned to draw with graphite, many decades ago. But it wasn't very long until I started drawing with India ink--commonly just carbon black in water, but often with something added for durability, like shellac. My first drawings were mostly done in basic drafting classes at a vocational college, but later elective work included illustration techniques like shading, stippling, hatching and air brush. One of the first, harsh lessons that ink taught me was the penalty for mistakes. Erasure of ink is very difficult, if not completely impossible. But ink gives wonderful results, a great range of values, and ink can be brushed, applied with a pen, blown (airbrushed) and so on to achieve a wide range of effect and textures. Making illustrations taught me care using ink while gaining enough experience to reduce mistakes. 

In the heyday of illustration, a century or more ago, pen and ink drawings were common in mass media. Magazines and newspapers were a huge market for illustrators' work. And so ink drawings were the rage because they reproduced so well in black and white. No need for expensive color processing. Today pen and ink used much less often. Nonetheless, I like doing pen work from time to time. 

"Salisbury House," ink on paper, 8x10

For example, "Salisbury House," is an ink and ink-wash drawing from several years back. It began as a lightly drawn pencil composition which I inked first with a pen to show basic outlines. The dark masses were brushed with ink, sometimes diluted to half strength or quarter strength, sometimes full strength. 

"Kerry," in on paper, 5x7

 

 

 

A considerably more casual and sketchy drawing is "Kerry," done in a pocket sketchbook in less than ten minutes. In this particular work  I used a technical pen while scribbling and hatching for dark masses. This is about 5x7. 

 

 

I like cartoons enough that I once had the fantasy of becoming a cartoonist. While that pathway was enticing, in the end painting was my major passion. Nonetheless I still do a cartoon once in a while, just for the fun of it. This one is a parody of perhaps the most famous underground cartoon of the hippie era, "Keep on Truckin'" by RCrumb. I drew this parody using a dip pen and ink. Dip pens have a steel nib that you dip repeatedly in ink, unlike most technical pens these days. And unlike tech pens, nibs allow variable line thicknesses, a real asset in experienced hands.

 

Folds

A few years back I wrote about learning to draw folds in drapery from one of my masters. Drapery and clothing are difficult. Breaking folds down into a few easily recognized and drawn types is the key to learning how to draw fabric. The ubiquity of folds in clothing, furniture drapery, curtains, and a multitude of other items means if you're going to draw or paint realistically, it's critical to understand folds. 

There are six or seven basic folds that fabric repeats: diaper, pipe, half-lock, spiral, drop, and zig-zag fold types are common. Diaper folds have a kind of droopy, swaggy appearance because they occur when a piece of cloth is supported in two or more spots. Drop folds occur where fabric hangs from a single support and drops straight toward the floor. Pipe folds are so-named owing to their resemblance to pipes--a stage curtain is a group of lined-up pipe folds. Half-lock folds are found when a tubular piece of cloth is bent, for example elbows in a shirt. Spiral folds occur in tubes of cloth as well, making spirals around the circumference. And zig-zag folds, again occur often in tubular fabric structures like pants and shirts. 

Diaper Folds

These configurations occur again and again in sculptures dating from antiquity and in paintings dating to at least the 15h century if not before. anyone who aspires to draw and paint figures must eventually grapple with how cloth drapes and folds and clings to the human form. It's worth reviewing once in awhile.
 

Drop Folds

Pipe Folds

Half Lock Folds

Spiral Folds

Zig-zag Folds

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Related:

The Wall of Pain

Another Spring Watercolor

Our cool wet spring has kept me indoors longer than intended this season. The uncooperative weather has featured mostly cloudy or grey days without much shadow--what skiers call "flat light"--which blunts visual interest. Most of those grey days were also rainy. Regardless, I still have the view from my studio of Druid Hill Creek.

Now that the days are longer and somewhat warmer, the honeysuckle along the creek has burst into leaf. The frothy green is beautiful against what's left of leaf litter, bare branches, and dark soil. Yesterday I stood in the window and did a small watercolor in one of my sketchbooks.

April Sketching

The advance of spring has been glacial so far. Even into early May we've had grey skies and rain. The warmth you'd expect has yet to materialize. Farmers are behind in their plantings and I'm behind in outdoor painting. The Saturday sketch group remains intrepid though, going out rain or shine on Saturday afternoons. These little watercolors that I make are great fun and help me mark time until I can manage full-scale plein air oil painting. 

"Early April, Gray's Lake," watercolor on paper

April was less cruel than you might expect, but stayed cool and mostly cloudy. The watercolor and ink sketch I made that first week of the month shows the drabness of the woods at the edge of Gray's Lake. The grass hadn't even begun to turn green.

"Waterworks Park, April," watercolor on paper

Three weeks later (above) the grass in the park across from the lake has gone bright green and hints of green are showing in the woods beyond the Raccoon River. This view is a road through Waterworks Park that winds along the river and into even wilder areas. I love to paint there. This particular watercolor was done from my car--a cloudburst kept me there for the entire painting time.