Chasing Monet

Haystack Rock
12"x12", oils on canvas

 I was looking for some new ideas for landscapes and also wanting to do some work with water, I decided to do some of the Oregon coast. I happened on a news article on Monet's water lilies and procured a used copy of "Monet Water Lilies - the Complete Series" by Rey and Rouart. I drooled over it for two days straight, trying to absorb the meticulous looseness, the freedom of not-necessarily-realistic colors, and the magic of the water's surface, the reflections and ripples. He was one of the first painters I studied and he's always been an inspiration to me.

Getting this book means I can stare at the lilies as much as I have time for—it's unlikely I'll ever make it to France! Sometimes parts of a painting look clean and spare, with just a few colors, or very similar pastels that relax the eyes and and the mind. Other times, in dark areas, it looks almost brutal, heavily overloaded strokes of colors that don't seem to make sense, but still convey deep mysterious darkness, lifting up the lighter areas and maximizing their impact. I feel like he's using color as a structural material, and I get the impression that he didn't have any qualms at all about using whatever colors he wanted to, whether his eyes could actually "see" them in the subject or not.

I wanted to paint Haystack Rock in as impressionistic a style as I could manage; by that I mean I wanted it to be loosely done, with vibrant, engaging color and simplicity of shapes, using texture and light to evoke a sense of presence. It seemed to me that his approach on the lilies was to lay in the water first with unstructured strokes, mixing many hues of blues, greens, lavenders, and then more-or-less draw in the flowers and lily pads with dry-brushwork, layering strokes until he got the depth and mix of colors he wanted. He doesn't bother with small details, letting one stroke suffice wherever possible, implying rather than stating, which in his hands conveys not just the water and plants, but a three-dimensional space and the feeling of looking at the subject as if you were standing next to him.

Another modern who impresses me in the same way is Sargent; his economy of strokes really amazes me, and it's a skill I really aspire to. I've heard over and over that suggesting the subject and surroundings engages the mind of the viewer more than explicit detail does, and enhances their sensation of the painting; I believe that is the the way vision works--you can take in a whole scene or you can focus in on one thing at a time.

Now that this one's finished, I'm starting another Haystack Rock, so I can explore other color palettes and more water formations, hoping to get closer to that magic that Monet was such a master of.

Lessons from a risky subject

 

The King

Finally put the last touches and a coat of retouching varnish on Smokey's portrait. I was really happy to finish and get ready for something different. The practice I got painting the fur was invaluable, also working out the colors for the fabric, and getting the "old paint" look in the background.

I've started work on a new small seascape and I can tell that I learned a lot on The King in handling the paint and understanding how I want the painting to look when I'm done. This reinforces my belief that the only way to get good at anything is to do it, as much as you can, as often as you can, and to explore every aspect of it that interests you. I've read plenty of books and watched videos, and I've learned many things from them, but until I pick up a brush and try something, it doesn't—it can't—make any difference in my work.

Sometimes a difference in the type of brush, or how you're holding it, or the consistency of the paint, or if you're using a medium or not, can make a huge difference in your results. The risks you're willing to take, trying a new approach or a subject you have no experience with, can open up new opportunities you'd never thought of.

But whatever you do, keep painting!

WOW!!--Lavender oil as a medium!!

The King (detail)

While I was working on my last finished painting I happened on some web articles about how some old Dutch Masters had used "Spike Lavender Oil" as a medium, and not really being all that happy with the 50/50 stand and walnut oil mix I was trying—it dried more quickly than walnut but usually took 2 days on thin-to-normal paint—I ordered some spike lavender oil and used it a little as I finished that one up. Then I started an 18x36" portrait of our Lynx Point Siamese cat Smokey (I wanted to figure out if I can actually paint fur, and practice my 'fine lines') and have been using the lavender oil exclusively. Wow!--the only pigment that does NOT dry overnight is white—all the other colors are dry to the touch and ready to paint over the next day! With that change, I found I've returned to my long-time habit of working in layers, building up color and implied texture in layers, fine-tuning the blend I want and making use of the translucency of most colors. The photo shows the closest-to-finished area of the painting so far.

The oil dries flat and matte, and is as clear as any other oil medium I've used but has a very faint tint, so it might start showing if  you end up with a thick pile on the canvas, but so far I haven't noticed. It's quite thin as oils go, so it's great for thin glazes or washes. I keep the large bottle next to my palette and use the long dropper that came with it—eazy peazy. Although I'm a fan of lavender in general, I DO recommend very good ventilation, and/or a fan behind you blowing it away from you. I use a fan and an air filter to minimize it, but it is one of the safest essential oils you can find and it's non-toxic and non-flammable, which take it to the top of my list! But if you don't care for the smell of lavender, wait till someone figures out how to deodorize it—without ruining it for painting in the process.

I can rub dry paint off with a paper towel some, so I'm thinking I may finish up the top layers with stand oil—or another mix. But it's fantastic for the way I approach painting—giving myself plenty of freedom to rework areas till they look like I want them to--without a bunch of uneven or unwanted build-up.

As for my fur renderings, it's not quite what I want, I'll probably keep experimenting with it, but it does look enough like fur to not be freaking me out. The fine line technique I wrote about last time is promising for fur. There are so many different tints and shades in his coat that layering is the only way I can think of to reproduce them. I'm not quite half-done, and it'll probably take me another month to complete it. I'll be back with more photos then!

Painting thin lines the easy way

Close to the Earth, © 2023 PM Arnold

20x20", Oil on gallery canvas

I took the photo of this Rabbit Brush shrub in 2002 on a trip up Hwy 395 to Mammoth Mountain from Ventura County in November. There was fresh snow on the Sierras and the leaves had turned orange and rich red-browns on all the willows and brush in the dry washes that ran from the foothills down into the Owens Valley. I rediscovered it looking through my old photos this fall and decided it was time to try painting it. I had had some practice painting skinny twigs and thought I might be successful this time, but was still very surprised at how well it went.

I've never had much luck painting thin lines with small round brushes, and especially now that my hands shake more than they used to. But what I have found that works is a 3/8-to-1/2" bright brush, synthetic or fine hair, using the long edge and touching it as lightly to the canvas as I can. The paint has to be liquid enough to flow off the brush, and if I make a blob or the line is too thick I swoop in immediately with a clean brush to pick up the extra. The other attribute of a brush this size is that it will hold a fair bit of paint, and it's not too hard to get a nice long line before you run out of paint. Only new or un-frayed narrow-edged brushes will work, and I try to keep a newish one on hand just for this purpose. Once I cover an area with lines I'll usually let them dry before I paint on top them; once I get good ones down, I don't want to risk messing them up.

In the photo, the sand & dirt was covered with a layer of tiny gravel, but I decided that was more texture than the painting needed, and just shaded in the varied grays and tans without offering much detail. Painting the live and dead branches took the most time, as I was trying to capture their varied colors and "bundle" appearance.

Is this what inspiration feels like?

Sunny Afternoon at Horsethief Butte ©2023

I was looking through all my Gorge photos and found a pretty dull shot of a streak-clouded sun above the landscape that really grabbed me. Staring at it, something in my mind spent a few seconds pointing out what I could do with its obvious challenges, and briefly I magically visualized what I wanted it to look like. Putting aside the other candidates I had pulled out, I used iPhoto to get more detail in the foreground rocks, and went to work. I roughed in the sky and sun first, realized that it looked exactly like I wanted it to, then worked my way down, pretty evenly, till it was finished. I'm sure that having pre-visualized the whole thing resulted in a better outcome than I'm used to having.

Since that approach to choosing my next subject had worked so well, I decided to try it again. I went through the large collection of candidates but nothing would talk to me. I looked back at my old photo files to trips in California, and came across a pair of subjects I'd thought about doing for years. These were taken on US 395, a winter trip to Mammoth Mountain, on the dry side of the Sierras with the mountains on one side and the high desert of the Owens Valley on the other. I had the same experience with them, of quickly going through the way I wanted to paint each one, the major steps to make it interesting.

I'm glad that my mind is finally catching on to the idea that I don't want to just copy a photo, I want to use it as a reference for a more introspective painting, with some particular feel, or emotion to it. It's rare that I take a photo that would be perfect without any changes, so being skilled enough to handle adapting it to catch people's attention would be a big step up for me. And another issue--a trap I'd like to not fall into any more is literally copying a photo because I love the subject and then finding out it makes a confusing, unfocused painting. I've done that more times than I want to think about it.

So if I can add this mental process to help me screen my photos for winners, that will be great! No more boring paintings!

Every painting a new learning experience

 

White Salmon River in Husum, WA
Oil on canvas panel, 18" x 24"

On this one I learned how to wipe off oil paint so I could repaint things I didn't like. I tried scraping it off with the palette knife, but I don't use enough paint to scrape off, so I used small cut-up pieces of paper towel, being careful not to scrub so I don't leave paper fibers in the paint. A little bit of turpentine on the towel helps stubborn paint. I always cut up a paper towel into a couple sizes of small scraps and stack them next to the palette on my table. A stack usually last me a few paintings, and they're really handy when I get paint where I don't want it. I also keep a roll of good, sturdy toilet paper there for wiping knives or brushes, or cleaning the palette. Most of the tricks I learned painting in acrylics also work for oils, but I'm having to relearn how to work with slow-drying paint. Sometimes, I just have to wait for it to get tacky--like when I have to rework small detail. The older I get, the more my hand moves in strange ways, and the more blobs I make.

I also got quite a bit of practice on this one doing blending on the canvas, and I recommend the Paint Coach videos on YouTube if you're new to oils. It is definitely easier to lighten than it is to darken something.

One thing I've learned in all these years is that it's REALLY important to have the RIGHT amount of paint in the RIGHT color and the JUST RIGHT consistency, to make a successful brushstroke, no matter what your style is. I guess it's only experience--millions of brushstrokes, or maybe billions--to figure out what that needs to be, every time you pick up your brush. Too much paint, it's a blob, too little, it's a stutter. But in creative hands, even blobs and stutters can make amazing paintings. In any case, I hope to be painting for several more years!

I finally found myself a painterly approach

For years I've been trying to loosen up my painting style and stop being locked into a purely realistic approach, and this painting feels to me like my first truly conscious achievement of a naturalistic painting that used brushstrokes as a fundamental element of the design. Participating in the Van Gogh immersive show last year was perhaps the final impetus to making that happen. Having the oil paints with their workability definitely helped.

I used mostly two brushes, a 1/8" flat and a 1/4" bristle bright, and adding a small 1/16" synthetic round for the foreground flowers and grass. Normally I would have switched to the small round to try to get the distant trees to look more like trees, but I've finally accepted that that's not what makes a painting good. What makes a painting look good to me is a good composition, an interesting or pleasing color combination, and some opportunity of mental or emotional connection.

I'm finding that I really enjoy painting the magnificent landscapes of the gorge and I want to paint as many of these beautiful places as I can. Coyote Wall is part of the Washington Syncline, a U-shaped fold with the youngest layers of rock on the inside. The other half of this U is on the Oregon side of the Columbia River Gorge. I'm not sure how the wall formed but it looks like a slump/slide to me. It's another famous climbing site, one of several in the Gorge. I took the reference photos in April of 2019, the year of the Balsamroot Superbloom.

It was a bit of a revelation to me when I first brushed in the trees, to find that they looked just like trees to me, and I remembered what I've heard many times from artists I admire that engaging the viewers' own imagination helps them connect with a painting. A realistic or naturalistic painting is an illusion that invokes a response from the viewer, and imagination is what makes that possible. So there's no reason to feel like you have to paint detail, unless you want to.