Assignment 1 Report Review

My work is all back complete with my tutor’s report. I certainly have some work to do, but from the report I do at least know which areas to concentrate on first. Going through the report:

General comments

The basic one here - sending work flat. That really is something I would prefer to do. I do really dislike the tubes supplied, and I had a real battle to get the work for the first assignment

in the tube. I’d rather send it flat packed whatever the cost.

I did leave the book work until after I had send off the assignment, so there were no log book entries at the time Richard looked. However, that said, the books recommended with this Assignment are mostly based around practical painting and the effects of light, so I was not intending to look at the work of other artists in detail at this time, but will now.

Assignment Questions: My Answers.

Seems I choose something that is not really straightforward. But then that is a question of interpretation, the course book suggesting things from the kitchen or everday items in the home. My definition of everyday items around the home, would be things I have to dust every week. Music is a large part of l

ife in this house, listening to it, playing it, and in my husband’s case writing and recording it. Thus there are a large quantity of musical instruments that I dust every week, and play some occasionally. Anyway, Richard’s point is well taken, now that I have actually stopped to think about it. That all objects are derived from cubes, cylinders, spheres and cones is something I know, but do not always remember, so I will try to make a conscious effort to think in these terms in the future.

I can now see why looking down at the objects ended up with me drawing them so small. At least I made the right decision in putting the table in. Richard has asked that I go and look at the still life work of a number of artists, and I will be doing that next. He said how devices such as a knife on the edge of the tab

le pointing to the viewer can help emphasise dimensions. There is a still life in Bristol Gallery by Pieter Claesz in which there is a knife pointing to the viewer and hanging off the edge of the table. At the time I studied this, I was looking at what it had to say about the period, morals and politics at the time it was pai

nted and not with regard to the actual composition. As this is a painting I really like, and is easy to go and visit, I think along with the list of artists I have been given, I will also go and see this one again, as this is an opportunity to analyse if from a different perspective, which appeals.

It seems that painting straight fine lines is going to be a questions of trial and error and practice, along with the occasional use of masking tape. I am heading off to the art shop to look into the list of mediums which will help to improve the coverage.

I am also contacting the college to see if I can obtain a copy of the booklist which will be going with the new Start Painting Course. Particularly as I have already come across the problem of some books being out of print, and not even available through my local library.

Assignment Work:

Project 1: From Drawing to Painting.

Richard is right when he says that I lack confidence as evidenced by the uncertain lines. I do need to do more regular drawing practice and am currently increasing this. Unfortunately due to last year being very difficult on a personal level, and the course work being essay based, my drawing practice did really come to a standstill. However the other problem I had in doing these drawing was the instruction to use A4. I had originally got out an A3 pad, as charcoal was required, however on re-reading the instructions it stated to used A4. This resulted in my being aware of being really constrained by the size of paper. So it is actually with a sense of relief that Richard has said there is no problem with using larger paper for this in future. I see A4 as fine with a pencil, or one simple object in charcoal, but far too small for anything more if using charcoal. I can see what he is saying about the maracas looking more like wooden spoons. They are something that initially looks like a simple shape, but as you draw they proved to be much more complex than first thought. The other problem, and I am not sure if this is good or bad, is that I really do not like being beaten, so instead of swapping it for a simpler object, and perhaps coming back to it at a later date, I keep working on it in the firm belief I will eventually succeed.

Shadows are something that I know I need to work on. Whilst I can see the difference between immediate and diffused shadows, I find it difficult to reproduce when my light source is not overly bright. Also I find if I am running off the edge of the paper, I seem not to let the shadow just run off, but instead curve it upwards. It seems my brain goes off and decides all the shadow shape should be there, even it there is not enough paper.

As to the series of paintings, I think, from Richard’s comments that I misunderstood the instructions. I was thinking that shading was required to achieve 3D, but read the instructions as being flat blocks of colour, resisting the temptation to add more.

Colour Mixing Exercises

I did enjoy this voyage of discovery. Finding out that the hidden background colours are important in order to know what to use to achieve the colour wanted. I am looking forward to practising this, even though I think there will be a level of paint wastage!

The report has encouraged me to practice more, and I’ve decided to just take a week or two to just do simple single object drawings, in an effort to improve my solidity and 3D. before moving on to the next assignment. I think this will be time well spent, even if the next assignment ends up being a week or two late.

Color Mixing and Effects Projects

Colour Mixing

I have done some colour theory work, a long time ago when in my City and Guilds Preparing Working Designs course, however it was very limited, and taught by the needlework tutor who leaned the course heavily towards pattern design, with only enough colour theory to do coloured patterns, and the painting was done in gouache.

The first part, ‘Mixing Colours’ was really interesting, far from easy, but did explain why, on the few occasions I have got paints out, I have struggled to mix colours.

In doing the first three flat blocks of colours, I became aware that the different pigments handle in different ways. The cadmium red going on smoothly, evenly and very dense in one coat. The cadmium yellow going on equally evenly, but with a transparency that required a second coat to get a dense layer. The ultramarine was streaky and uneven, and more coats had to be applied to get a dense even colour.

When it came to the mixing, I got what I expected from the orange group, however the green I expected to come out more to an emerald tone rather than the olive, and the red/ultramarine mix was a surprise, but also instantly explained why I have always ended up buying a violet paint.

Moving on to mixing the black and white into the colours, I was surprised by how little black is needed to achieve a change and in direct contrast, how much white is required. I think most of my darkened tones are, in hindsight, too dark from start to finish. I did not have this same problem doing this one the design course, so wonder if a part of this is the difference between gouache and acrylics.

The mixes with the orange and green did pretty much go as I would have expected, the the red/ultramarine did not, and it was interesting to see the lightened shade of this mix, which I could not have predicted.

The colour circle was enlightening. Although during my design studies we had been made aware that of variation in colours, the information we were given did not go far enough to explain the colour mixing, in the sense of needing two different reds to get a pure red, and likewise with the yellow and blue. Doing this exercise has opened my eyes to how important it it to be aware of exactly which specific pigments need to be combined to get to the colour which is wanted.

The tone scale was something I had some difficulties with initially, finding that squinting helped, I then just took my glasses off! Being very short sighted, no glasses means all I can see are colours, no edges, and identifying tone became easier. Though it also left me feeling that a greater number of greys were needed in the grey scale, and although I had reduced the amount of black being added it was still too much. In the extended tone chart, I found some mixes were so close, they came into the same grey match, so cut them in half and put two in one square. In the case of one of the ultramarine, the last mix is so dark, that I do appear to have achieved a black, and so have stuck that square in there.

I was surprised by the range of browns achieved by mixing the complementary colours together. Whether using coloured pencils or paints, I usually find I never have the brown I want, so although I have a few purchased browns, I will be trying out more of these mixes, as I feel this way I will eventually be able to create more natural browns.

Effects of Colours on Each Other

I read the Itten book when I did the colour drawing course. However many of the illustrations are so small, that it is difficult to see what he is saying in the text. All became clear by painting these much bigger squares.

I have to admit that I was often surprised by the result. At this stage, rather than trying to control the results, I was trying to predict it, having done the grey squares first, followed by the fourth row with blue centres, where the outer colours have the same tonal value. This row I think has resulted in far less a change in the centre colours. After this I just worked my way down the sheet. I expected the dark violet to kill the yellow, but it hasn’t, though the dark yellow does not do a lot for the pale yellow. I was suprised how orange the red became when surrounded by the lemon yellow.

I went on to do a few experiments in pointillism, whilst I can see the patterns in the mix, I cannot honestly say they create the colour that would be achieved if you mixed the paints. Though the further away you get, the great the effect of ‘mixing in the eye’. Though I perhaps struggle here because although I can appreciate the work of Seurat, I personally prefer my colours in sweeping shapes in the style of van Gogh, or big bold blocks such as Leger did. I have to say I admire the patience of artists who worked in pointillism, I actually get very bored, very quickly doing that.

The final stage of this, the red cross on the grey paper. Unfortunately, the light is very poor at present, therefore the effect is minimal. There being insufficient light for the cone to really get stuck on the red. However I have visited Rousillon, and went into the are where the pigment were mined. In the bright light of southern France, and surrounded by all the oranges, when I came away from the mine, I was aware of seeing greens everywhere for quite a few minutes. I also notice the orange of the ground made by denim shoes appear to fluoresce in the bright sunshine.

What have I Achieved ... and Learned.

I failed to get smooth even colour everywhere, mainly because I failed to make enough of some colours to be able to add additional coats. I have been surprised by how much paint is needed to cover various size areas. At the moment, my estimation is falling short, but this is something that I think will change with more practice.

My control is improving but still needs work. I like leaving the acrylics alone, and only having a little water on my brush when I dip into the paint. However at the moment I sometimes get too much on the brush which gives me a ridge, and removing the ridge gives me a smudge in the wrong place.

I think my colour mixing will still take practice, but I think I can now approach it better, as these exercises have given me a better understanding of each pigment and their differences, and I can better analyse what will be needed to make a particular colour. these were exercises I enjoyed doing, and an looking forward to practising. I had the basic understanding taught to us as children, and unfortunately the colour work in my design course had taken me very little further. I usually gave up painting because I got frustrated by mixing colours and not getting the expected result, in the end I usually reverted to a very large box of colour pencils for my design work. This is the area I have always seen as my failing, however these exercises have shown me that it is not that I am unable to mix colours, it is that I have been trying to do it without enough knowledge of the contents and therefore reaction of the pigments to one another.

I have enjoyed doing these exercises, particularly because they have addressed things I have struggled with, and given my logical answers. My confidence has increased by finding that I can draw with a brush straight on to paper, it may be only simple shapes, but I have been able to do it. Also, being able to actually mix a whole variety of colours by finding out about the different properties of different pigments.

I have even been out and bought an A4 spiral bound pad of paper heavy enough to apply acrylics on, simply to use as a sketch book with acrylics, and I would have to say it is because I have just had so much fun in my initial discovery of acrylics.

Project 1 and 2 Drawing and Painting.

I have now done a selection of still life sketches of the same group of objects from different angles.

Going back through them, I found I added more shading to most of them, in order to give a better 3D image. In the first drawing I had completely missed out the edge of the table, so all the objects and their shadows were floating in space. Though adding the table top did improve it, it still left that one maraca lifting upwards.

The second drawing I again added to the depth of shade. I did not add more shades of grey, I just darkened them down one by one. This one does really need paper added to the top, to put the rest of the head of the manikin in, however the drawing is in a spiral bound book, so this is a little impractical, and I do not feel it it is worth tearing it out for such a small addition.

The third and fourth drawings were particularly pale. These were done on a different day to the first two, and I remember it was rather a dull day. My natural light comes through a big 10’ patio door, a dull day always leaves me with a very flat lounge in terms of colour. Therefore I think these 2 drawings reflected the lack of bright light. I darkened some of the third drawing, but not the fourth. The fourth I did as a vertical rather than a horizontal piece, and I think the softer shading works.

The fifth drawing was done from behind, and I stopped after doing the bongoes and manikin. I felt that the amount of the maracas which was visible did not add anything, and overall, this particular drawing just did not work.

The sixth drawing I did from above. Up until now the objects had been quite a reasonable size on the paper, and sometimes too big. They had all been drawn from similar angles, either just slightly above, below or on a level with them. This was the only one I stood up to draw, and for some reason the objects are all very small, and almost lost on the page. They are so small that much of the table top is visible and two of the legs of the table ... which I have not got quite right.

I went on to experiment with masking off. I found most the sketches benefited from reducing in size, and even the most disappointing of them had possibilities if some of the objects were cut away. The upright one was the only one I felt did not really benefit from masking off, although I did find reducing the edges a little gave a slightly different look, but was not of any great benefit. I did not feel that adding to any of them would bring any improvement. This is the first time I have tried masking off sketches, and it has been interesting to see how something useable and workable can exist within a drawing which as a whole fails. In some cases I felt the improvement was simply that the drawing became less busy by masking off areas, and this alone made a much more pleasing image.

My final choice for painting was the only one that started as a vertical format. I drew this from below which resulted in a dynamic perspective, and made for a less busy composition. It was whilst doing this drawing that I realised where I been going wrong previous with the maracas - I had failed to observe that the handle of the maracas joins the oval section in the centre of the ball, and so my earlier ‘lifting’ maracas were caused by that meeting position being incorrect.

My first attempt at the painting resulted in something that just felt and looked wholly wrong. I allowed myself to be side tracked by the fact that the yellow ochre is a very similar colour to the light wood of the table. This result was an insipid painting which failed on every level. So I went for a second attempt, thinking in terms of shapes only. I felt the way it worked best was to consider the bongoes to be part of the negative shapes, in order to have more negative shapes to play with. The resulting painting is far better than the first attempt. Normally I would automatically put far more detail in, however I feel this picture actually works as a painting, without detail. My husband suggested that as it stands it would make a good poster for live music in a club.

For me this has been an exercise of all positives:

A disappointing drawing may have something to offer if masked off.

Though these drawings did not benefit from adding anything to, I can think of drawings I have done in the past that would benefit from this. So nothing is wasted.

Be open minded about whether something should be drawn as a vertical or horizontal, as well as the viewing angle. There can be no doubt that when I arranged these objects, they were in a horizontal format, to be viewed from the front. However the best drawing is a vertical format, and viewed from the side.

During drawing the objects, I did not think in terms of the number of tones I used, but just got on with representing the objects and trying to avoid adding too much detail. Looking back through, I have ended up with around four or five tones to each drawing.

I can draw directly in paint on to paper, and do not need to sketch with a pencil first.

And finally, that I can draw without putting in all the detail. Something I want to achieve is drawing and paint without including every last detail. I enjoy photography, and do take the view that if I want every last detail I can take a photograph. What I want to produce as an artist is an impression not a copy. Seeing the painting which resulted from leaving out the detail, has shown me that I can leave out detail and be happy with the result.

I have for a long time known what I want to produce in art, but had no idea how to get there. How to free myself of habits which I knew were holding me back. I feel like I have now taken my first steps in the right direction, and found there are ways of breaking habits which may not be bad, but are not always helpful.