Maybe theme is the wrong word, maybe condition or stage is a more correct term.

I find with painting students and some that have been at it a long time are really hesitant to take a chance with their work. They hesitate to let any painting they do get away from them. Students expect their oil paintings to look great at the beginning and get better looking as the oil progresses.

This is where they are mistaken.

Art is a flowing give and take medium. You must take your oils and manipulate them on the canvas, move them around and let the paint work for you. In doing so, you can then start making adjustments. You cannot correct your painting till you get some paint on the canvas and you cannot get painting on the canvas while trying to maintain a good looking drawing in or start.

IN other words; your painting has to go through hell before it can become great and arrive were you desire.

The beauty of oils for the painter and it does not matter what type of artist you are… the beauty is working that paint, using this medium, manipulating your desired goal to your will.

Wiping out, redrawing, rethinking .

Feeney Class, Cape Cod Art Association

The first session at the Cape Cod Art Association went well last week. I gave my “Take the bad colors off your palette now,” lecture without too much feedback.

Paint companies are in the business of selling paints. They don’t really care if your work is improving or stuck in a Burnt Umber rut.  They just want you to buy as many different tubes of various colors as you can.

Now me, I’m all about mixing my own colors. Not that I am a great colorist but I do recognize problem colors and students that cannot let them go.  I went over some of these colors with my new students and could feel the good  mood deflate in the studio temporarily.

For the Student-

When you are buying your supplies in the future,  holding that tube of Sap Green in your hand wondering what route to take to improving your work, right now, … the challenging, satisfying… let me try mixing my harmonizing colors myself route, or to take your tried and true method and just squeeze any old tube habit?

Don’t be a sap.  Just because it’s in an art supply shop,  that does not mean it will help you create art.

The other day I was at Craigville mid-day in the rain.  I could see paintings in several directions. Sometimes the light is right, the weather enhancing  and the art so obvious.  Sometimes as a artist you get around to painting a scene you have been watching for years without realizing it.  You know what size to paint it.  How to lay it in, and it all comes so easy.

When starting a painting,  being afraid to commit is a very good thing.  That is right where you want to be.  I tell my students to take their time. What is the rush to get locked in?  It’s  good  not to be able to tell a figure from a tree trunk sometimes. While laying in a new Paris painting recently I really enjoyed the slow process of the emerging figures. Two weeks into the painting now and I still have a lot of room to make changes in the placement of basically everything while I get the mood and key established.

Soft edges and mystery, that is where it’s at. Flexibility at the easel translates to a strength of options.

Don’t commit too soon.

Now I did notice the tide was coming in but I just figured I would keep an eye on it. Starting my own study quickly so I could get an example on canvas for them. Within fifteen minutes I had covered my small canvas and went to start checking on the students. Make sure everyone chose a strong composition and had their easels set up sufficiently.

Quickly I realized the tide was not bad near me but it was swiftly moving in surrounding some cars and painters. “Everybody pick up and move out!” I shouted. “Quick quick.” I was impressed how fast everyone moved back up the dirt road to higher ground. They scrambled. I caught my breath and turned around to see that one student had forgot his easel and within seconds it was sitting in the salty water.

I went back and retrieved the easel and reset the class on safe ground nearby.

This gave me a chance to expound on the beauty of painting from memory. “Remember the clouds rolling past. Remember the distant dunes and the hint of color changes in the large marshland.” And they did.

All good studies produced from memory. Next time I could check the tide chart. Na, I would rather keep it exciting.

As soon as I got to our site today the students were all over me asking, “are we  still painting outside today in these winds?” A mutiny on my hands. It was indeed windy.

I listened to my weather radio after class and it said the winds hit 32 Miles an hour or 30 knots this afternoon October 4,2008. It just came out of nowhere. But considering last week we canceled due to a tropical rain storm I was somewhat determined in the second week of our eight week class to get working in the elements.

So if I cannot get them to paint in the difficult elements, then I would show them it could be done, that it should be done. Because it is only on days like today that an artist sees the trees rocking, the clouds souring across the sky, coming from the southeast. The noise was what struck me. The leaves and branches battering against each other. Debris flying through the air. But mainly the clouds roaring overhead in big billows of layers in a hurry to the bay.

I compromised and said we would stay while I demo-ed some important things and then we head back to the Conservatory to paint inside the rest of our class time.

They were all over that.

I set up to do a simple demonstration and it ended up taking two paint boxes to keep my easel in place to work. I painted quickly explaining what I wanted to capture today. A day like this there are no hard lines, no hard edges because everything is moving in the breeze. It is all blurred. The landscape is soft in the movement.

I finished quickly getting a solid study done and they hurried off quickly, driving to the classroom.

But I cannot help thinking of the missed opportunity today for them. As a teacher I failed to get them to work in the tough circumstances. Failed to get them to take the risk of a fallen easel or of learning how to weight one’s easel against the wind and take the extra five minutes to secure the canvas for painting.

Because it’s only when you step up to the challenge, that art is rewarding.

The wind was coming in off the water on one of the last days of the summer of 2008. The sun was out and the students were game. I had everyone do two quick studies in the three hours there. Having them concentrate on getting in the flow of working outside and not worrying about making paintings today but just doing studies.

I told them today we are going to do little Hawthorne studies. “Do you know what that is?”

“No,” they said. Charles Hawthorne talked of putting one note of color against the next note of color. Getting the colors right and the painting will take care of itself. So simple, so true.

The stripers were jumping out of the harbor after the bait fish. We watched them just below the waters surface.

I am very happy New Orleans was spared for the most part with the latest hurricane. Seeing the footage on television just makes me want to go back soon, and I will. In the meantime here is the remaining painting available from my Pre-katrina holiday there.

If anyone knows which restaurant this is somewhere off of Bourbon Street I would love to know.

In the meantime I call it “French Quarter Fountain.”

This is a new Fenway oil I just finished. It is more a Kenmore Square motif than a strict ballpark picture. But I am really feeling like the neighborhood around the park is becoming an extension of it.

I really like a lot of the ownership and neighborhood business’s additions.

This new painting is being exhibited and made available at Trees Place, Orleans Ma. And it’s not much of a stretch to admit I have done more Fenway Park paintings than anyone else ever. It’s been a great changing motif for me since my first Lansdowne Street attempt in 1986.

I am having an opening at Trees Place this Labor Day weekend and this painting among other new urban paintings will be available.

This “Boston Skyline, Kenmore Square” oil is 36×48″ o/c. It’s so fresh it is still wet.

For more information: www.Treesplace.com

www.Fenwayart.com

Go Sox

Today I was able to bring my students to MY teachers studio.

My generous teacher Sam Barber shared his waterfront property with the class, painted with them and handed out cold cans of beer for the critique after.

This day spent by the ocean in Hyannisport, a beautiful August day like today. Breezy, sunny, Kennedy’s everywhere.

He is not teaching anymore but was happy to see my students this once and let them paint on his gracious grounds. Outstanding beauty. Potted plants and statues silhouetting against the sailboats. I had all my students walk around and take photos before they take their supplies out of the car.

I only heard one “I didn’t bring my camera” and one “I don’t know how to use my camera”. If you forget your camera on a day like today it is a great loss.

There are many motifs, too many for just one afternoon. That is why the camera is so important. They were a little overwhelmed trying to decide where to set up and what to paint. But they all did a good job covering the canvas and getting a study down in the two hours there.

Please check out Sam Barbers work at www.Sambarber.com or www.Treesplace.com

That is my last class this month. Starting a new “on location” eight week class- September 19, 2008, please call the Conservatory 508-362-2772 for inquiries. Thank you.