Sometimes it seems that painters look for answers anywhere except from where they can most readily find the truth… personal observation. I get loads of emails asking about everything, literally, from what kind of brushes I use to where to eat in Rome. A recent question came in regarding the different colors for painting snow versus those for painting white sand. I love this question! It seems logical and that it should have an easy answer.
The problem is, there are no easy answers. Sure, I could spout all sorts of physics equations and present scientific research on the reflective and refractive indexes of surfaces. Any of you can look online and read the same. (Search Albedo Measurement just for fun.) Of course, what we are really talking about are the differences between snow cones and grits.
Percentage of diffusely reflective sunlight relative to various surface conditions:
The combination of reflection and refraction of an ice crystal is such that the snow can appear to be sparkling different colors. Snow is translucent (whereas water is transparent), and when there are a g’zillion tiny snowflakes laying on top of their hexagonal selves, the light is reflected back toward the light source and the viewer. A snowflake has such a complex, intricate structure that light hits internal crystal faces and bounces around inside the crystal, refracting the light wave and causing it to change angles (refract).Since all the colors in sunlight add to give white, what we see when we look at snow is white: the sunlight that has reflected off and refracted through the water (ice) crystals to come back at us. So, what’s that color in the shadow, then? It is the sky and surrounding objects’ colors (not white light, but say blue, violet, or whatever). Because it is in its purest state, it may appear rather saturated.
If we are looking at white sand, however, we need to remember that it is comprised of different particles such as silicone dioxide (in the form of granite) and other gems and minerals filled with particles of impurities. The light hitting these tiny grains scatters about, some absorbing more light, others very little, and at differing speeds. The appearance to the novice may be similar to snow, but after much observation it becomes more apparent that one is an opaque surface and the other a translucent one. Just as in any situation, the same theory applies to the shadow color, which is reflected sky and surroundings’ colors, but is now relative to a totally different surface condition.
Do you need to understand all of this to be a painter? No. Simply take the time to go out and truly observe. Any time that we as artists rely on some other artist’s color formula, we are merely poor imitations of the other artist. Will it work? Probably. Will it get really boring to you after a while? Absolutely. I believe that if we keep an open mind and an open eye, our powers of observation continue to get better and better, with or without a scientific understanding for what we are seeing. What we once saw as gray, suddenly looks blue or violet. As we continue to progress in our development, we begin to notice the effects of nearby buildings, trees, etc. into that blue shadow as well. That is usually when our sometimes overly chromatic purple shadow actually becomes more beautiful due to other colors we choose (or not) to put in as well. Instead of just looking intense, the color is now alive and vibrant.
Wait! I just asked you to learn to observe and now I’m asking you to make a decision about those observations. Yep. You’re a big boy/girl now and you get to make your own decisions. You choose what to put in and what not to put in. You choose how chromatic or neutral you want your painting to be. You are in control of the painting, rather than the other way around. This is where science, personal observation, and creativity collide and you are a full-fledged artist. Congratulations.
Here’s my challenge: Find out where you think you are along this path, and be open to growth into the next phase. Never just settle for someone else’s answer; find your own.
A final word: Yellow sand, good; yellow snow, not so good.
Archives for March 2018
Choosing a New Direction
One of the biggest lessons I’ve been learning lately as an artist is to be patient with myself and the process. While patience often comes naturally with age and experience, it can also be developed intentionally in your art by forcing yourself to step back from a painting and allow it some time and space. In a previous blog post called “Let the Dead Paintings Die,” I discuss letting go of paintings for good. But in this post, I address giving the work a second chance. Sometimes it takes weeks or months before a painting can “tell” me what it needs. My recent painting, “A New Road,” is a great example of this.
I began this piece nine months ago. I am usually a very fast painter, especially when I am excited about the subject. Sometimes I can finish a large scale painting in a matter of 1-2 weeks… so nine months is a ridiculous amount of time for me. From the start, I was excited about the painting’s potential, but here’s the story of why it took me so long to complete it.
To begin, I painted a color study from life with the model on location and took several hundred reference photos of her in a lovely wooded setting. In my studio, I created five or six concept sketches that had potential as studio paintings. In my opinion, the strongest design was one showing her standing with her guitar, her face in profile, and a dramatic tree extending diagonally upwards behind her. I thought, if I could pull it off, it would be a bold and gutsy decision to have the branch coming out behind her head, with cascading branches and leaves creating a natural vignette above her, and the tall grasses completing the dark framing at the bottom.
But execution of the idea proved to be disastrous. First of all… I’ve never been the kind of artist who delights in painting every single leaf (I am all about shortcuts!). Second, I’ve never attempted to paint a tree this large, in a portrait, with the tree having this much importance in the design. Given that my model, Corinne, had posed for me in the spring, the leaves were not even fully developed yet, they had an airy, wispy look to them—in other words—no structure. No defined shapes. It was a nightmare. At first, I attempted to paint every branch and leaf, still trying to “design” the diagonals and shapes as I went but becoming quickly exhausted and annoyed with it. I let the painting sit for a while, only working occasionally on the figure or the guitar, which both came much easier to me! Then, I decided to go back to my original location and re-shoot the tree. I went back twice, but the summer weather proved a nuisance each time, clouding over when I needed sunshine. Additionally, the tree had filled out and didn’t even look remotely close to the way it had in the spring. I found other trees with similar branch structures to photograph and use as reference.
Months went by. I kept trying one approach after another. I changed the shapes of the larger branches. I tried making everything lighter… then I tried making everything darker. I hated everything I was doing. As I type this, I realize how pathetic all of it sounds!
Finally… this past week, after another failed attempt at resuscitating that stupid tree, I mixed up a giant glob of pale yellow and painted over the entire background with a palette knife. It was invigorating. I was finally willing to let go of my initial design and allow the painting to take a direction of its own (hence, the painting’s title, “A New Road”).
What was my original problem? Was the design truly flawed to begin with? Was I trying to paint something that Richard Schmid might call “impossible to paint?*” It might have been a little of both. But the bigger issue was that I was too attached to my initial sketch and setting, and it was taking away from the beautiful subject: Corinne and her guitar. Thankfully, I was happy enough with my painting of her that I did not give up on the whole thing. One small step towards maturity as an artist is to not be satisfied with leaving a painting, knowing you are only truly happy with parts of it and not the whole. I’ve called too many paintings “finished” that were gorgeous in some areas of the work and subpar in others. Now I’m determined not to let anything slide, even if it means my productivity is going “down” (if you know me, then you know I am an obsessive worker. It’s probably the best AND worst thing about me). I would rather have ten excellent paintings than 100 that are just okay. Hey, maybe this means I’m finally graduating to the next level in painting!
In summary, if a painting is worth rescuing, then do it, no matter how long it takes. And be willing to think beyond your initial concept. Let go of the thing that’s holding you back from making it great, and allow yourself creative freedom to do whatever it takes to bring the painting to the next level! In this case, I repainted the entire background, creating an impressionistic rendition of a sun-dappled path… and it fit the painting perfectly. Hopefully the lessons I learned from “A New Path” will prevent me from scrapping future paintings when all they need is a little time and patience.
Alla Prima: Everything I Know About Painting (Richard Schmid) Chapter 1 “Good Ideas and Free Advice”, p. 19.
Dear Harlan,
Sometimes I find it hard to gather words sufficiently. But I decided long ago not to let that shut me down in speaking or writing. Thus my brief letter to you.
I like the way you lived.
In my mind’s eye I can see you now stepping Thoreau-ish into the woods with an axe in one hand and a paintbrush in the other. That plaid flannel shirt was your go-to and there was such resoluteness in your ways. At first glance one might call you a quiet farmer. But your silence was of the contemplative nature that longed for bird song to echo around in your soul. And your farming was simply an expression of your hunger to create, as you also did with watercolors and oils. You once said, “A painting, to be good, must be done with dash and abandonment, even one which has meticulous detail. If one niggles over it, the result is dull and lifeless.”
Well, dull and lifeless you were not! After building a shantyboat out of whatever was at hand, you and Anna took years to actually float the Ohio River from Kentucky clear to New Orleans… stopping only to grow summer crops on a south-facing slope! You loved the earth and treated her as a loving mother, receiving not taking.
In your paintings I see that non-niggling dash and abandonment, sort of like author Annie Dillard describes,
One of the few things I know about writing is this: spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. The impulse to save something good for a better place later is the signal to spend it now. Something more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, from beneath, like well water. Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.
As far as I am concerned, Harlan, you emptied your creative savings account on Campbell County Hill Farm. And for that I am indebted. You see, that’s me taking the final trek to where Papa plows the team. When I make the turn toward Dale Ridge he will see me, and I will be home.
When painters like yourself give it all, it serves us all. When artists speak story into us, it calls story out of us. When the hours of mixing and dreaming and wiping out and starting over and story-telling with your brush turns into days, you are doing a good work of inviting others like me into living more fully alive.
That fully-alive thing happens in me too when Kathie calls out, “I just saw something! Turn the car around!” My blood starts to pump as well knowing we just passed an old forgotten home or a partially hidden trail marked by scores of yesterdays. As I pull over I’m aware that she has already begun to shoot it, play it, lose it, all. The foot of her dash and abandonment is tap-tap- tapping against the floorboard. And it affects me as well.
Countless times I have witnessed a sort of seed-to-fruit moment as a bystander gets caught up in the excitement of my wife bringing a blank canvas to life. Like you, Kathie wants her story- telling to come from her deepest places… all the way from her toenails, she likes to say.
The nature of the created universe is to give, not take. Hard to tell exactly what the result is from all your giving, Harlan, all your painting-what-I-feel-inside. But, whatever it is, it’s good. Give a little and more follow. And souls like mine expand on account of that giving. Yeah, that’s the end-product… an expanded soul!
And my expanded soul is grateful.
May you and Anna now somehow be creating in your rest and resting in creation,
~ Buddy
PS – Thank you, Wendell Berry, for introducing me to your good friend.
- Photo Credit: Guy Mendes.
- Annie Dillard, The Writing Life, 1989, HarperCollins Publishers.
- Campbell County Hill Farm, Harlan Hubbard, 1933, Collection of Anne Ogden.
- KathieOdom.com, 2017.
- Wendell Berry, Harlan Hubbard, Life and Work, 1997, The University Press of Kentucky.
- Kathie and Buddy Odom, Photo Credit: Amanda Lovett.
Confessions of an Unartistic Father-In-Law
My son-in-law is Jason Sacran. That simple fact constitutes my one and only real connection to the art world. What follows are the confessions of a man who has had art thrust upon him, and has lived to tell about it.
I am not an artist. I confess that right out of the gate. In fact, if you were to do a nationwide search to locate the individual who was least like a graphic artist, I might be your man. Drawing stick figures taxes my ability to the limit. So, when an aspiring young painter suddenly joined our family circle, I knew that I was going to have to enlarge the scope of my knowledge if I was to be able to carry on anything approaching an intelligent conversation with him about his field of endeavor.
I did know a few names, so I dropped them occasionally: Picasso, Rembrandt, American Gothic. I knew just enough to ask questions to make it sound like I knew more than I did: “Who do you think was the greatest of the Impressionist painters?” (I was fairly sure that Impressionist was a type of art and not the name of an artist, so I took the chance and tossed it into the conversation.) The problem with such opening lines is that after the line was opened, my expertise was closed. I was at a blank wall and could go no further. So . . . I determined that I needed to further my education in art.
At this point we need to drop back in time and fill in the background just a little bit. I live in rural west-central Arkansas, about an hour east of Fort Smith, the second-largest city in the state. Saying that this area is not exactly a hot-bed of artistic sentiment is one of the more profound statements I will ever make. If you have an interest in deer hunting, football and pick-up trucks, you could hardly come to a better place; but if you mention that you are a painter you are likely to be asked what you would charge to put a fresh coat on someone’s front porch. (In this area the correct pronunciation of wash is “worsh,” and ought is “ort.”) I am happy to say that my own family does have some artistic talent. My younger brother is a commercial artist and his daughter is amazingly talented in the field of ink drawings. However, my background and that of my parents is in music, and we did not venture at all into the graphic end of the art world. I taught school for a couple of years, decided I was not any good at it, and ended up working in the office at a corrugated box plant for 26 years. (Boxes do have flutes and flutes are shipped in boxes, but that is about as close as they get to the art world.)
I have six children: two boys, and then four girls. So, I have had The Conversation four times – the one about marrying my daughter. There was one question that I asked all four of the young men regarding the material support of my daughters: “Would you be willing to work a double shift at McDonald’s if that is what it took to keep food on the table?” All four answered in the affirmative, and I have to give them credit that they all are hard workers who have given me no concerns in that regard. However, if I had known then what I know now about the life of an artist, I might just have probed a little further.
You see, Jason and Rebekah got off to a very rough start. Leah, my third daughter (fifth child) got married in August, and right about then Rebekah announced that she was going to get married that November. I answered, “Oh, no you are not! not if you expect me to pay for it. Your mother just got through with a wedding, and she has all the holidays folderol just ahead, and she is having to help take care of your grandmother. You put it off at least until after the first of the year so she can catch her breath.” She relented and moved it out to January 8th.
It was cold on the day of the wedding, we had all that wedding pageantry right on the heels of the holidays, with Jason’s family coming in from Tennessee; and on top of it all, Jason got sick. I mean sick! (I will spare you the medical details.) He did not even attend the rehearsal. He was white as a sheet during the wedding. We had to tell him what he was supposed to do in the ceremony, and he could barely stand. They were going to stay at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, and Jason was too sick to drive. Then they had a flat tire right about the intersection of Interstates 30 and 40 in North Little Rock. Jason could not change the tire because he had taken some medicine to help with his nausea and was completely out of it. We called someone we knew in the area to come help them.
Soon the children started arriving. Their first two daughters were born within a year of each other. (They are the same age for three days.) Two more followed very soon after that. Jason worked at the Art Center in Fort Smith for a while, taught a course or two at UAFS, and somehow they stayed afloat. In about five years, Jason decided that he wanted to try to make it strictly on his painting. It was at this point that the term “starving artist” began to pop into our consciousness. Oh, they made it, but most of the time just barely. Paint-outs all over the country, commissions, teaching seminars – any way and every way to keep their noses above water. And, of course, the bad thing about being a painter is that a) the income is not guaranteed, and b) it is not on any kind of a regular schedule. Trying to stay on a budget was well-nigh impossible for Rebekah. Occasionally we would loan them money against prize money that Jason had earned, but which was slow in arriving. Add to that the fact that Jason was on the road much of the time, which was stressful both for him and for Rebekah. I have seen it up close, and I assure you that it is not an easy way to make a living. You just hope and pray that the artist’s health and his wife’s sanity hold out. So far they have. (Those of you whose job it is to actually send out the prize money, please be prompt. Somewhere out there could be a father-in-law who is underwriting your award, and artists have to pay the light bill just like everyone else.) Things have gotten somewhat better in recent years, but it was quite “interesting” for a while, to say the least.
So, moving back to my education as a father-in-law: I needed to learn something about art, so I figured our family’s resident artist was the best place to learn. The first thing he taught me was not to be afraid to dislike one painting and to like another. That sounds simplistic, but you artsy folks might be amazed how intimidating it is for a landlubber like me to utter, for example, “I don’t think I care for van Gogh.” Still, Jason assured me it was OK not to like his work, so I hitched up my britches, stuck out my chest, and said it a little louder: “I don’t like van Gogh!” It felt pretty good, actually – sort of therapeutic. I, Mark Green, grandson of a Depression dirt farmer, have a firm opinion about something in the world of painting. I am somebody! Of course, then I had to come up with a positive opinion. “I do like much of Monet’s work, and I really like Rembrandt.” Believe it or not, even as hidebound and reactionary as I am, I do like a significant portion of abstract art.
I had nudged the bare tip of my nose above the surface of the art-lover’s pond. But why did I like Monet, and why did I not like van Gogh? Well, there you had me: I did not have the foggiest idea. So, Professor Sacran took me in hand and began to feed me little tidbits about what makes this a good painting and what makes that a bad painting. I learned, for example, that just because I say I do not like a painting does not mean that I am saying that it is a bad painting. It might be a great work, but simply one that does not appeal to me for whatever reason. In fact, he informed me (much to my dismay at the time) that van Gogh actually was a very skilled painter. That rocked me back on my heels for moment, but I rose heroically to the occasion: “I don’t care if he is great, I still don’t like him.” That really felt good.
Now began my training in earnest. Periodically I would visit Jason’s studio (which is in the small house where my grandparents lived, under the shadow of Mount Magazine, the tallest point in mid-North America). I would say that I liked this painting and did not like that one – right to his face. And he just smiled. I even developed the temerity to tell him that a particular painting of his was not finished and that he needed to go a little further with it. Jason was very gracious and patient and would act like my opinions actually carried some weight (age does have its privileges). And finally I arrived. I got to the point where I could look at one of his new paintings and say, “I really like this one because . . . ,” and have a valid reason.
I am not an art connoisseur, and never will be. I do not have the time to spend on such a project nor the inclination to spend it. At least, however, through the kindness and patience of the father of four of my eighteen grandchildren, I have reached the point where I can confidently say that I have a clue. I do not know all the answers, but at least I can ask a few intelligent questions.
One thing I have learned about painters: evidently the most important thing you can do to become famous is to die. Death somehow seems to improve a painter’s works exponentially. Now, the walls of my house are literally papered with genuine Sacrans (most of which I picked up at fire-sale prices through my father-in-law connection). But I am 64 years old, and I am not eager to get rid of my son-in-law just to jack up the prices of my art collection. I certainly hope that my daughter is not a widow within my lifetime. So, if I am going to make any sort of a profit from all these paintings before I kick the bucket, the rest of you folks are going to have to start buying them pretty soon in large quantities. Supply and demand, you know. All you supply-stokers out there, let’s get moving! I am not getting any younger. (Besides, this guy is really good; and you have that as the official opinion of a quasi-educated art-loving father-in-law.)
+++
Folks, laying levity aside for a moment, much of what I have said here concerning Jason is just as true of a multitude of aspiring young painters across the land. Theirs is not an easy lot. Even though some would term it foolishness, it does take a great deal of courage to launch out on a career of painting with no guarantees whatsoever of success. Where family responsibilities are attached, it doubles the risk – and the stress. Please give some consideration to purchasing a work by one of them. Who knows, you may be buying a canvas by the next Picasso. But even if he does not scale that lofty height, at least you would be doing a good deed in helping one of those whose goal is to bring visual beauty into our lives.
It has been a real pleasure getting to know my in-laws, the Greens, over the last thirteen years of my life. From the very go it seemed that I was destined to be a part of the family as they took me in and made me feel welcome from the start. In fact some of them have even become subjects of my paintings, especially, “Grandpa” the patriarch of the Green family. I would say for a time he was somewhat of a muse for me, having painted upwards of a dozen studies and significant paintings of him. His son, my father-in-law, Mark Green, has recently become a subject of a life painting since retiring from his job. He visits me at my studio sometimes and we talk shop and solve world problems. This is where the idea for this article came about. He asked if he could write an article about or for me since he had the time now that he’d retired. I, of course, replied in the affirmative, and he began throwing out possible topics. At some point I asked what he thought of me, as an artist, coming into his family and taking his daughter. I told him, I’d be curious to know what his thoughts were over the years in whatever way our interaction has played out thus far. Thank you for your story, Pappy (Mark).