Art Blogs

Top of Phantom Bluff

Though the purpose of this blog, for me, has been to force myself to keep painting in order to have new work to post, and as a way for me to plot my progress as I try to learn how to paint, I realize that there may be other things I can do here that might be of value to the few readers who return to follow my musings.  I in no way would want to presume to teach, since I am still such a student myself with so much to learn, but that doesn't preclude sharing.  I have made it a practice to follow a number of art blogs each day, gleaning bits of information or inspiration from them.  I also watch an inordinate number of Youtube videos showing technique or the collected paintings of great painters, or the advice and tips from other painters working to improve their own art.  Why, then, not share some of my favorites here?

One blog that I can recommend without hesitation is Stapleton Kearns.  He really seems to be done with blogging, having posted only ten times in the past four years, and I don't go to him daily to check up on what he has recently added.  Instead, I treat the collection of his posts as if it were a massive reference on learning how to paint well, which it is.  He has posted nearly 1,000 posts, and each one is thoughtful and full of intention, sharing what he learned as a painter taught in the atelier system that was the classic means of instruction in the past, but has fallen from favor in the past century.  He is earnest and dedicated in his sharing, posting nearly every day even while he was working to make a living from his painting, and he acquired quite a following because of the value he offered to the world of art.  His own painting is representational landscape, though I'm sure he learned figure painting and still life as a part of his instruction.  His wicked sense of humor makes reading him even more enjoyable.  He frequently presents paintings by others and then offers a critique, helping us all to understand what makes a strong design, what makes a good painting.  He also covers the work of many great painters of the past, sharing some of their better work, commenting on their technique or on their strengths.  Below is one of Stapleton Kearns' paintings, to give you an idea of his style:

And below is a brief selection from one of his posts.  I hope I am not stepping on any publishing taboos by sharing this here; I certainly don't intend to offer this as my own work, nor am I being financially rewarded in any way for sharing it.  My only intention is to get you to go dive into the vast wealth of information that is Stapleton Kearns:

I referred to the "big look of nature" the other night, and I want to add a little to that . It is a crucial concept and is so important that I want to be certain that I have explained it completely. If you already have it, forgive me, this will be a review.

There are two ways of seeing any scene before you. One is the "big look" and the other is piecemeal. The big look, is when the eye apprehends all of the scene before you in it's unity and entirety and it is thus expressed. "Piecemeal" (now there is an old fashioned expression, I wonder if it is still in use?) is when the artists represents each section of the scene as it looks when it is studied on its own with no reference to the larger view. A piecemeal painting is actually a number of small paintings on the same canvas.

The most important quality that a painting can have, (or any other kind of art for that matter, including a song, a design for a chair, or a Greek vase) is
UNITY OF EFFECT

Unity of effect is when the painting is perceived as a whole, one unit. Failure to get the "big look" is such a problem because it destroys unity of effect. Sometimes a painting is said to "hang together" when it has unity of effect. This can be observed at a considerable distance. I can often tell whether a painting is professional or not from across the street, sometimes even before I can make out its subject.

One of the reasons fine painters often downplay detail is to keep the unity of effect, detail scattered all over painting can do that. A painting can be filled with detail and still have unity of effect, but that detail has to be part of the larger unified system and keep it's proper place in the tableau.
Art students like to make sketches and rough unfinished work because the unity of effect is intact, no area has been worked up very much, so no two areas fight with one another for our attention. Unity of effect is easier to get in a quick study and hard to keep in a protracted one.

So if you are working to learn as much as you can on your own, or even if you are taking classes and workshops or are enrolled in an art school, it won't hurt to take a look at Stapleton.  The nature of blogs is that they are backwards, that the most recent is at the top, and I have found it more useful in this case to go back to the beginning and try to work my way forward.  The volume of the posts is probably equivalent to a huge tome, something over 2,000 pages in length, so it will take some time to work through it.  I have been going back to it for several years and still haven't read it all, since I try to save it on a tab on my browser, but eventually the computer is shut down for some reason and I have to try to go back and find where I left off.

And now back to my own work:  LOPAS, our plein air society, continues to meet every Friday, and though I don't get from my efforts any work to hang, I do gain a bit of confidence and comfort, and I am working toward being able to more accurately put down what I see or what I intend.  Below is last Friday's result.

I tend not to continue on these once I am back in the studio, even if there are glaring flaws, since the purpose isn't the painting, but the experience.

And below is another portrait I started, but it needs so much help at this point.  I will probably still try to make a few corrections (the eye on the right - his left - is TOO SMALL!) and everything about it is too rough to be considered complete.