New York Scenes

This was fun to create and about all I could handle as I recover from my trip!
It was awesome. Ken Auster is a fabulous painter, we all knew that. But he is also a generous and enthusiastic. He shared so much information with us, managed the time well, and really inspired me.
The city itself is inspiring as well. I have to say that though it mizzled (drizzle and mist) most of the time, it was good to see Ken work under less than ideal conditions. It can be done!
I didn't include Ken's demo images because I didn't feel it was right to share his techniques without permission. You can see a video of his work in progress on his website though.

Music by Peekaboobebop.

Painting from Photographs

I am working on a larger city scene - or 2 or 3 - but specifically trying to fix my overhead umbrellas view which I still believe in. I was surfing last night to find some overhead crosswalk images in the city. I think that dimension will much improve my scene, but I didn't have the right photo. Anyway, I have nothing to post, but I found some amazing photos on Flikr, which led me to this photographer, John Fraissinet.

Now, as a note, this was just research to see how the crosswalks in NYC are painted. I only use my own photos to paint from. First, I have to have the connection to scene. Obviously there is something that sparked my interest in the first place and I have a mental image of the painting to be as a result. I have ownership in more way than one. Second, I look for different qualities for painting purposes. Generally, my photos would not make good art in and of themselves.

As an example, here is one of my photos which inspired a recent painting:



I found this interesting article not long ago (Fogonazos.blogsot.com) on the masters use of photography. Generally, the assumption is that the early impressionists relied only on observation and life drawing to paint from, but there is evidence that they were also excited about the prospects that photography had to impact their craft.

I obviously paint from photos and sometimes I feel like I must hide that fact in an age when plein air and painting from life seem to dominate the representational art scene nowadays. But, as a reminder for all those who might also turn to photos to help them create art, photos are a starting place only. As we all know they tend to mass the darks and lights and lose a lot of interesting color and dimension. I continue to study the human figure from life. I do a lot of sketching in cafes. I rely on my memory of the scene and my education to take the flat photo to an impressionistic scene full of life and movement. I hope so anyway!