Life gets in the way!

We all want to be productive artists. The picture of ourselves sitting in front of the drawing board, coloring, drawing and producing is how we all view ourselves. We love the thought of putting out one remarkable piece after another, swimming along with art popping out of our pores and nothing stopping the process. Believe me. It’s a Pipe Dream!

Life gets in the way!

For instance, right now I have just finished a really spectacular piece and begun another, and it was going slow but sure along the usual route. Then along came a distraction of mammoth proportions and although I tried, my mind could not concentrate on the task at hand. I figured it would go away, but the distraction became more important. My Mother-In-Law, a wonderful person who is the kindest woman I have ever known, is dying. I live right next door to her, so it hit me pretty hard. I had to be there to help where and when I could, and although my art is very important to me….well it didn’t come close to this in importance.

I suppose there are those that could take all this pain and hurt and make great art with it. So far, that has not been the case with myself. I just plain go empty and it does not matter to me. Maybe when all this comes to a conclusion I can finally pick up the pieces and begin to go back to my life as it used to be…that will never be the same again. I hope I will be a better person after this. Perhaps my artwork will reflect the change. I also hope that I will be able to work through this sort of thing in the future, sort of keep creating while the world spins out of control, but I think that might be a pipe dream of my own.

We should all fight distractions. That is what we are told I guess, but I think they are there for a reason. What is it that the Lord would have us see or feel or take care of that we have not been attuned? We need to make time for our artwork or it will not be produced in the first place, but some distractions are well worth the time lost at the drawing board. When we come back maybe, just maybe, we will see with a clearer vision, with more spectacular colors or with added feeling that would not be achieved in any other fashion.

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My Mother-In-Law, a most generous, kind and loving woman passed away yesterday. I will miss her dearly. She should get a medal as the best Mother-In-Law in the world as far as I am concerned. Thank you Mom for helping me be a better person and see more clearly the important things in life.

Overcoming Handicaps

When I first began to focus on my art years ago I was so excited about painting and making art. All my life I had been drawing and reading and studying on my own trying to learn about color, composition and anything I could find to educate myself.

In the midst of all this discovery and excitement I went to the eye doctor for my son and while waiting took the Color Blind Test. To tell the truth it felt weird. I saw things sometimes but at other times saw nothing. The doctor came out and asked how I was doing. I must have looked worried, so he gave me the test. I failed. Dismally. He told me I was one of the worst female cases he had ever seen. I took more tests and failed them as well. I can remember going home and crying and feeling so sorry for myself. How was I ever to be a fine artist when I could not see color? It seemed impossible.

I see color. I see the autumn colors at this time of year and they look vibrant and glorious just like they are supposed to. So how can I be colored blind? Well, the first thing to learn is that there are varied levels of colored blindness. They call me color recessive, because I see some colors very well, but others seem to recede or go un-noticed entirely. At other times I do not see colors correctly, they may look more red or green to me than to others. So I began to teach myself about color. I learned its properties, about value and contrast, warm and cool colors, and also about the color wheel and how it works. I figured if I learned about the handicap I could also figure out how to overcome it. And I think I have for the most part learned to think of it as an advantage and not the opposite.

It is far more important for an artist working in color to learn and understand values. Where does that color fall in the gray scale? How dark or light is that color? For many artists colors sing to them. They sing so loud they cannot hear the value whispering. So although they may paint or draw a very colorful picture it is somehow flat and does not feel lively. It may be that the values are mostly midtones. They lack darks and lights, or value-change throughout the picture. In this I am far ahead of the game, for I see value first and color second. I do not have to wonder about value because it is the very first thing I notice and then the color will sort of sift through, slowly being noticed. I concentrate hard trying to see as many colors as I can.

For some reason I can see temperature very easily. Do you think about the temperature of a color when you are doing you artwork? It is one of the main things that I notice. Is that a warm blue or cold blue? Is the object a cool red or a warm red? This may seem unimportant to some, but to me it is uppermost in my mind, because if a picture has too little of one or the other it will lack vibrancy and pizzazz. There should be balance.

Does the picture have story to tell? Do the pictures colors help tell the story? Bernard Poulin, www.poulinstudios.com, has a striking picture on his website that has haunted me ever since I first viewed it. It is a lonely picture, taking place around midnight, and the colors are all extremely cool except for where the man stands, which is warmed by warm light and draws you in with shadows of mystery. The colors tell the story because color has personality and psychology. You could not convince a viewer of the same story using warm welcoming color in that picture.

The picture above is about old things more than new. The colors help tell that, with the rusty reds and the old browns. These items look used and homey. The water and suds look cool because the colors that they are rendered in are cool.

The picture also works well because it had a dynamic composition that is a bit unusual. The values are good as well, for they range from very dark to very light with a fine range in mid-tones. All these are much more important to me than basic color, because the warmth and values tell the story far better.

Think about these things the next time you think about what color to put down. Do you know what value it is or if it is a warm or cool color? I think you might find it to be an interesting exercise that will help you make a convincing painting.