Thursday 30 September 2010




Course work: Two additional sessions of adjustments to the grey scale: I’m getting closer to equal steps between the squares, but am not yet there. Cut out the 4 cm colored squares in preparation for (someday) gluing them onto the value-scale sheet.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 320-355

(A fairly difficult book to read, requiring close attention and short reading sessions, but yielding exhaustive coverage of the artist’s work in the 1913-17 period, which the authors consider the critical years of the painter’s career.)



Sketchbook work: A pencil sketch in my pocket sketchbook of a 13-year cicada, found dead on the porch.

Time today: 1 hour 14 minutes

Wednesday 29 September 2010




Course work: Repainted the grey scale yet again, and painted the colored squares.



Reading and theoretical studies:



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 208-240



(This is a fairly interesting book, although the only copy I was able to find was published in 1978. A more contemporary work that covers the same subject is Margaret Livingstone’s Vision and Art: The Biology of Seeing, which I read earlier this year, and which I would suggest as a replacement for Dr. Gregory’s work, as it is aimed more directly at the reader specifically interested in art.)





Sketchbook work: Attempted a small drapery sketch with paint left over from the grey-scale work, using the brush in hand. Not too successful.

Time today: 1hour 43 minutes

Tuesday 28 September 2010




Course work: Repainted the six intermediate steps on the value scale, this time erring on the side of painting them too light.



Reading and theoretical studies:



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 174-207



Sketchbook work: A very quickly done partial sketch of one of the horses having a lie-down; he was up and gone before I could finish.

Time today: 1 hour 10 min

Monday 27 September 2010




Course work: Drew the grid for Project Three, and painted a grey scale down the left-hand side. I may have to do some additional work on this, as the tendency of acrylics to dry darker continues to cause me difficulties.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 300-318



Sketchbook work: A graphite-pencil drawing of part of a piece of driftwood that we keep as a scratching log for the cats.

Time today: 1 hour 52 minutes

Sunday 26 September 2010




No work today; spent the day packing my Drawing One work to be shipped for assessment.



Weekly reflections on learning experience: Color experimentation continues. The three-color mixing project in acrylics went fairly well, and I supplemented it with sketchbook work in marker and in colored pencil. My acrylic color circle is not fully satisfactory, but I am fairly pleased with the one done in oils. My reading program continues satisfactorily.

Saturday 25 September 2010




Course work: Rather than paint an extended color circle as suggested by the text, I elected to paint a second color circle using oil paints, on oil sketching paper ~40 x 50 cm. I found this somewhat easier than the one done in acrylics, although the three yellows remain differentiatable only in bright sunshine and it was necessary to thin the violet color substantially in order to obtain a color that is recognizably violet.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 270-299



Sketchbook work: In my pocket sketchbook, a scrap of ribbon lying on my wife’s workroom floor. I then had a try at it in my larger sketchbook, using acrylics: my intent had been to paint the form of the ribbon with a single stroke, but I think that I would need a flat rather than a bright to succeed at this. It is possible that I should have thinned my paint a bit more as well. However, even experiments that fail are worthwhile.

Time today: 2 hours 9 minutes

Friday 24 September 2010




Course work: Painted the color circle (Project One), using the specified colors. The mixture of crimson and ultramarine blue makes a very dark, rather brownish violet that photographs as black; had I been given my choice, I would have mixed violet with pthalocyanine blue and alizarin crimson. The mixture of cadmium yellow and lemon yellow can be distinguished from its neighbors only in a strong light. I was unable to get a good uniform application of crimson or ultramarine blue. In other respects, the project went about as I had anticipated.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 241-269





Sketchbook work: The head of a replica of a Maya figurine.

Time today: 1 hour 44 minutes

Thursday 23 September 2010




No work today…traveling to help my mother choose a new retirement home.

Wednesday 22 September 2010




Course work: Painted the two columns derived from adding white and black to a mixture of cadmium red and ultramarine blue. In this case, rather than selecting the midpoint of the two mixtures, I chose a brown, (since the midpoint color is, for all practical purposes, black). The brown and black mixtures were difficult to arrange in even steps, necessitating several re-paintings. The brown and white series terminated in a color that I can described only as a greyed pink. I then repainted the orange and black column yet again, finally getting reasonably even steps.

I then constructed the color circle for Project Two on a sheet of paper of ~A2 size.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Michael Wilcox Blue and Yellow Don’t Make Green

North Light Books Cincinnati, Ohio, USA 1994

Pp. 95-117

(Although I have read this book at least twice before, I always get something new from it.)



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 128-173



Sketchbook work: As an extension of the color mixing exercise, I did an acrylic sketch of a pumpkin (found growing wild in our compost pile). Colors used were cadmium yellow light, cadmium red light, ultramarine blue, and white.

Time today: 2 hours 7 minutes

Tuesday 21 September 2010




Course work: Painted the green plus black and the green plus white columns: the former needed several re-paintings, as the already-neutral green darkened very quickly with the addition of even very small amounts of black. Repainted the orange and black column, with some improvement, but I’m still not entirely happy with it.



Reading and theoretical studies:



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 106-127



Sketchbook work: A hasty scribble in my pocket sketchbook of three people in a coffee shop; I’m still uncomfortable doing this sort of sketching (which means I need to do more of it).

Time today: 53 minutes

Monday 20 September 2010




Course work: Painted the red-to-blue row, using cadmium red light and ultramarine blue. These colors are near-opposites on the color wheel: one would expect neutral colors to result from the mixtures, and that is exactly what one obtains: a mid-brown, a near-black, and a blue-grey. (Parenthetically, the closest mixture to black that I have found is burnt umber and pthalocyanine blue.)

Proceeding to Stage Two of the exercise, I did the first part by mixing an orange from approximately equal quantities of cadmium red light and cadmium yellow light. I then painted two columns of squares, one with increasingly darker mixtures made by adding ivory black, the second with increasingly lighter mixtures made by adding titanium white. It appears that the darker column will have to be repainted owing to inhomogeneity of paint application. The darker squares in this column have a slight greenish cast, presumably caused by the slight bluish cast of ivory black.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Michael Wilcox Blue and Yellow Don’t Make Green

North Light Books Cincinnati, Ohio, USA 1994

Pp. 48-94



Sketchbook work: A second set of color experiments, using Prismacolor pencils in ultramarine blue and those selected as the closest matches to cadmium red and cadmium yellow. As expected, results quite similar to earlier color tests were obtained, indicating that my color selections were reasonably correct.

Time today: 1 hour 26 minutes

Sunday 19 September 2010




Course work: Repainted the intermediate steps in the yellow-to-blue row to make the steps more even; painted the red-to-yellow row, using cadmium red light and cadmium yellow light. With the yellow-to-blue row, one obtains a series of greyed greens that would be useful in landscape painting; the tendency toward neutrality is accounted for by the relative distance of the parent colors on the color wheel, even though both are “warm” colors. With the red-to-yellow row, one obtains a quite satisfactory orange series, because the parent colors are fairly close on the color wheel, and both are “warm” colors, as is the desired orange mixture.





Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 222-240





Sketchbook work: A short set of color experiments using Prismacolor markers selected as the closest matches for cadmium red light, cadmium yellow light, and ultramarine blue.

Weekly reflections on learning experience: This has not been a very productive week. A day of illness, two days devoted to assisting my wife with setting up, conducting, and cleanup of one of her charity fund-raising events, and one day mostly occupied with driving to a neighboring state to retrieve a piece of farm equipment from the repair shop have taken their toll: the urge to nap is stronger than the urge to work.



Time today: 52 minutes

Saturday 18 September 2010




Course work: Continuing to use acrylics, I painted in three squares in the color mixing exercise, using ultramarine blue and cadmium yellow light, and their mixtures. May repaint them, as the steps became much darker when they dried, and those from yellow to greenish-yellow and thence to yellow-green are unsatisfactory.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Paul Zelanski & Mary Pat Fisher Colour

The Herbert Press, London, 1989

Pp. 85-135



Michael Wilcox Blue and Yellow Don’t Make Green

North Light Books Cincinnati, Ohio, USA 1994

Pp. 7-47



Sketchbook work: One of the cats, asleep on the back of a chair. (She’s not allowed here, but she’s never been one to be bothered by mere legal quibbles.)

Time today: 1 hour 32 minutes

Thursday 16 September-Friday 17 September 2010


Fully occupied assisting my wife with a charitable project.

Wednesday 15 September 2010




Course work: Completed construction of the grid for the color mixing exercise. Started painting in colors in the squares.



Reading and theoretical studies:



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 81-105



Christopher Butler Modernism: A Very Short Introduction

Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010

Pp. 80-102

(One of the hazards of buying books via the internet is unclear description: this book turned out to deal with the entire range of Modernism, not just with visual art. Since the author is a professor of literature, the book was strongly oriented toward his specialty. Nevertheless, the book was worth reading, if for no other reason than that, while it places in proper perspective the curious mixture of failed political systems, discredited psychological notions, and outright mysticism that so influenced modernism, the author does not conclude, as do far too many authors of books of this category, that such ideas have any remaining validity in our era.)



Sketchbook work: A none-too-successful attempt at depicting the view through the door of my office/studio; the vanishing points are widely scattered when I check them, yet to the eye it looks about right.

Time today: 2 hours 23 minutes

Tuesday 14 September 2010




Took the day off to recover from side effects of influenza shot.

Monday 13 September 2010




Course work: Rather than using paper strips to isolate areas of interest in the negative-space painting, I chose to do the entire process with the computer, which makes the selection process faster and much simpler to record. After trying over a dozen possibilities, I settled on six that had enough interest for further consideration (although the last two are almost abstract, and one, an inverted image of the corner of the stand, is probably outside the intention of the exercise).

If I were going to choose one of these for further development, it would probably be #3, although it is probable that for the full-color painting I will revert to the design of one of the earlier charcoal drawings.



Stage 4:



“Were there better viewpoints than the one you chose?” I’m sure there are several; one, an eye-level view about 45° further to the right than the one I painted, is interesting, but would be difficult to do given the limitations of my “studio”, and it would not have worked as a negative-space painting.



“Did you choose the best drawing to develop?” For the objectives of this exercise, I think that I did.



“Did you use only four tones in your charcoal drawings to translate the tones in your group of objects?” To the best of my ability, I did so.



“Would you change any of the tones in your drawings if you started again?” Almost certainly, I would. One never sees things the same way when looked at a second or third time.



This project has been valuable to me as an introduction to acrylic handling, and as a refresher in thinking about negative shapes. I do not think that my resulting piece of work is either very successful or very interesting, but it was a useful learning experience. I think that I am ready to proceed to ‘Colour Theory and Practice’ now.



Started constructing the grid for the color mixing exercise, on ~A2 size paper.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Paul Zelanski & Mary Pat Fisher Colour

The Herbert Press, London, 1989

Pp. 9-84



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 196-215



Sketchbook work: A sketch of a pine cone, not well done. (Side effects from influenza shot are beginning to be bothersome).

Time today: 2 hours 41 minutes

Sunday 12 September 2010




Course work: Smoothed the background grey and worked a bit more on the drapery, then used another mixture of all three colors for the flat tone on the objects. I’m not satisfied with this, but I don’t know what else to do to it.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 178-195



Having encountered several references to the influence of Bergson’s philosophy upon artists in two of the books I am currently reading, I took some “off the clock” time this afternoon to look into it. On the basis of my admittedly limited overview, it appears that the major components of his philosophy are his ideas of time and of knowledge. I see little value in differentiating between “pure” time and “mathematical” time: describing perception of time as “subjective” or “objective” seems quite sufficient, and requires no additional definitions. Nor can I agree that there is an inherent superiority of intuitive knowledge over intellectual knowledge (although this seems an argument that many reluctant students would willingly embrace!). One assumes that Bergson’s speeches and publications must have been sufficiently dynamic to make his ideas sound original and exciting, but I remain unconvinced (I suppose that my personal philosophy would be best described as skeptical pragmatism.)



Sketchbook work:

A page of gestures of hummingbirds…almost an impossible task. Seldom are they still for as much as two seconds. Even using a reasonably good camera, I have had only limited success in eleven years of attempts at photographing them.

Weekly reflections on learning experience: Working with acrylics requires my developing a new mindset and a new approach: acrylics do not permit the leisurely contemplative approach that oils, with their easy blending and “when in doubt, scrape it out,” allow. With acrylics, one must approach the subject boldly, accept less-than-perfect blending, and learn to love brush-marks. I find the darkening of color upon drying disconcerting, and difficult to plan for. Experience is the only cure for these problems.



My reading and theoretical studies are progressing satisfactorily. I need to work more in my sketchbook; this seems harder to do than it was when I was working on the drawing course.



Time today: 2 hours 20 minutes

Saturday 11 September 2010




Course work: A second layer of paint on the background: my intent had been to make the background more uniform, but in fact I made it less so.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Christopher Butler Modernism: A Very Short Introduction

Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010

Pp. 56-79



Sketchbook work: Modifying an introductory exercise in Discover the Joy of Acrylic Painting (Jacqueline Penny, North Light Books, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, 2002) to employ black, white, and yellow ochre, I did some experimentation with color mixing on the paper as well as on the palette. It is clear that I have a long journey ahead. Since my sketchbook paper seems to tolerate acrylic fairly well, I plan to do further similar exercises.

Time today: 1 hour 7 minutes (25h12m)

Friday 10 September 2010




Course work: Started trying to put in some suggestions of shadows, and folds in the drapery. As yet, I have not been able to get acrylics to behave as I feel they should; the extremely rapid drying time has prevented anything but the crudest of attempts at blending.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 152-177



Sketchbook work: A pencil sketch of a raccoon skull.

Time today: 1 hour 10 minutes

Thursday 9 September 2010




Course work: Another application of paint around the setup and onto the hanging cloth, along with a few adjustments of form.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Christopher Butler Modernism: A Very Short Introduction

Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010

Pp. 36-55



Time today: 59 minutes

Wednesday 8 September 2010




Course work: Commenced work on Project Two, Stage One. Sketched in outlines of my still-life setup, on ~A2 paper, using thinned black acrylic. Although I encountered a few difficulties, including a tendency to draw objects instead of shapes, these were somewhat minimized by my having drawn the objects several times previously. The contour errors, and the error in the size of the pear that is now apparent, should be fairly easily correctible as work progresses.

I then did some experimentation with black and yellow ochre, to get a general idea of the range of color and tone I had available by mixing these two.

Using black, white, and yellow ochre acrylics, I mixed a light grey, a medium grey-green, and two darker grey-greens, and applied them to the appropriate areas on the paper; my objectives with this first application of paint were to get down some approximate tones, correct the worst shape errors, and gain a little experience with mixing and handling acrylics, a medium with which I have done only minor experimentation. It appears that I will need some additional tonal correction and some more minor shape correction in my next working session.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 120-137, 144-151



Sketchbook work: Sketched in charcoal a bunch of bananas, one of which was unusually long. Then I got interested in the stem end of the bunch, and tried with limited success to draw it with colored pencils.

Time today: 3 hours 12 minutes

Tuesday 7 September 2010




Course work: Reverting to Stage Two of Project One again, I redrew my still life, after having adjusted the components into a more open array and having assessed it with a view-finder in order to be sure that it was acceptable from the viewpoint of fitting a sheet of ~A2 size. (This image is saved as Project1Stage2_6.)

Reading and theoretical studies:



R.L Gregory Eye and Brain: The Psychology of Seeing (3rd Ed)

McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1978

Pp. 37-80





Sketchbook work: A page of almost-gestures of grazing horses.

Time today: 1 hour 38 minutes (17h44m)

Monday 6 September 2010




(A fairly busy day of moving, stacking, and covering hay cut into today’s work on the painting course.)



Course work: After some additional experiments with masking off and with a view-finder, I have concluded that although the vertically-extended drawing done yesterday offers potential for an interesting negative-space painting, it does not even approximate the shape of an A2 sheet. I will have to do some object rearrangement and lengthen the horizontal axis.



Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 108-119



Time today: 33 minutes

Sunday 5 September 2010




Course work: Using a pair of cardboard “L’s” I went over the five Project One Drawings, looking for smaller areas that might be compositionally interesting. I photographed these for future reference:

I then proceeded to Project One, Stage Five, and extended one of my drawings. The only feasible way of extending it was vertically, and, after adding a sheet of paper to the bottom, I did so. This resulted in a drawing that had an entirely different emphasis from the original drawing: now the stand and the drapery seem as important as the objects. This would make an interesting painting, especially if I filled in the space under the drapery with a dark tone, although it may not be an ideal subject for the forthcoming negative-space painting.

After some further consideration, I saw that my fourth drawing could be extended with a little modification of the original drawing. I don’t really like the result: it gives me the feeling that my original objects are huddled in a corner waiting to see what that bottle is going to do.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Looked online at a number of paintings by Albert Marquet.



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 88-107



Christopher Butler Modernism: A Very Short Introduction

Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010

Pp. 14-35





Sketchbook work: A sketch of the corner of one of the book-cases in my workspace.

Weekly reflections on learning experience: Making the transition from one course to another is always stressful. I am reading about, and trying to develop an appreciation for, Matisse in particular and modernism in general, neither of which I have previously found of great interest. My work has shown the problems of transition: I know I can draw better than I am drawing, having just completed the drawing course, but I cannot seem to get my fingers and my brain to work together. I went through similar difficulties every time I moved from one assignment to another in the drawing course, so I have every expectation of improvement.



Time today: 2 hours 6 minutes

Saturday 4 September 2010




Course work: Reverting to Stage Two, I rearranged my set-up on a larger surface, lit from above and to the left. After replacing the wooden apple with a wooden pear, to make shapes a bit more varied, I did another charcoal drawing of the revised setup.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 72-87



Sketchbook work: A sketch of the hay delivery we received today: caught the light at an interesting time.

Time today: 2hours 3 minutes (12 hours 33 minutes)

Friday 3 September 2010




Course work: Starting the Project One, Stage Three work, I laid the four charcoal drawings out side-by-side, and concluded that the first or the second would make the best negative-space painting, but that the fourth would make the most interesting tonal or full-color painting.



I then made 10 x 15 cm copies on light card and using acrylic paint, painted the fabric black, the background a mid-grey, and the objects white, as an experiment to further assess the shapes as negative shapes. None of the four provides an identifiable shape for all five objects. This little experiment was useful even if my conclusions were unchanged: it led me to wonder if I should rearrange the objects in a more open configuration (the rather tight grouping I have used is dictated by the size of the stand upon which I have placed the objects). I’ll think about this.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 56-71



Christopher Butler Modernism: A Very Short Introduction

Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010

Pp. 1-13

(I purchased this book for exactly the opposite reason that I purchased the one above: I want to be sure that I have a reasonable overview of the Modern era, to help me keep my more-detailed reading in perspective.)



Sketchbook work: A pencil sketch of reflections on a metal goblet.

Time today: 1 hour 57 minutes (10h30m)

Thursday 2 September 2010




Course work: A fourth preparatory charcoal drawing, about 90° from the first, lit from the right with a small spotlight.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 44-54



Sketchbook work: A charcoal drawing of a towel. This towel makes fairly frequent appearances in my sketchbook, as it is easily visible from my workspace, and time spent untangling the complexities of drapery always seems worthwhile.

Time today: 1 hour 53 minutes

Wednesday 1 September 2010




Course work: Work continues on Project One, Stage Two with a third preparatory charcoal drawing, this one done from a standing position, in a horizontal format.

Reading and theoretical studies:



Stephanie D’Allesandro and John Elderfield Matisse: Radical Invention 1913-1917

The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA, 2010

Pp. 18-30, 32-37

(I selected this book because it is not just a superficial overview, but an in-depth examination of an important period in the painter’s life. Matisse is not a painter I have greatly appreciated, and perhaps a prolonged, detailed review of this sort will help me to overcome that lack. Reading will be fairly slow and deliberate, and other books will be read along with this one, as is my custom.)



Sketchbook work: A short series of highly gestural cloud studies (~2 min each) drawn through a rectangular aperture taped to a window. I picked a very bad day for this experiment, as out almost-invariable late afternoon cumulus buildups failed to appear. I’ll try again.

Time today: 1 hour 36 minutes