Friday Inspiration: Books about Landscape Painting {Free Online}

{the blustery sky today}

Today we are having an unusally warm day, I have the windows open in the house, and it is wonderful being able to air out the rooms and hear the birds chirping in the distance.

It is the end of January, but it feels like spring is just around the corner... which means I will be able to go out and paint en plein air soon! So with that in mind, I thought I would share with you some of my favorite landscape books that are available online.


Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison
{as a side-note, do not bother purchasing a re-printed copy of this book on Amazon because the scan is so poor. I did because I love to have a book infront of me that I can add highlights, dog-ears, and notes, but I was terribly dissappointed in the quality of the book and find the link above to be a much better quality, so I wasted paper and time with the purchase...}

The Art of Landscape Painting in Oil Colour By Sir Alfred East

Imagination in Landscape Painting By Philip Gilbert Hamerton

Brush and Pencil Notes in Landscape By Sir Alfred East

Light and Water: a study of reflexion and colour in river, lake and sea By Sir Montagu Montagu-Pollock

Landscape and Power By W. J. Thomas Mitchell

Have a wonderful weekend and see you Monday! 

Liz

John Ruskin: Lectures on Landscape

{Tree study by John Ruskin, 1845}

This week I have been listening to John Ruskin's Lectures on Landscape and the ideas and thoughts presented have been particularly inspiring to me. Here is a expert from the first lecture I thought you may like to know about:

"But though the virtue of all painting (and similarly of sculpture and every other art) is in passion, I must not have you begin by working passionately. The discipline of youth, in all its work, is in cooling and curbing itself, as the discipline of age is in warming and urging itself; you know the Bacchic chorus of old men in Plato's Laws. To the end of life, indeed, the strength of a man's finest nature is shown in due continence; but that is because the finest natures remain young to the death: and for you the first thing you have to do in art (as in life) is to be quiet and firm—quiet, above everything; and modest, with this most essential modesty, that you must like the landscape you are going to draw better than you expect to like your drawing of it, however well it may succeed. If you would not rather have the real thing than your sketch of it, you are not in a right state of mind for sketching at all. If you only think of the scene, "what a nice sketch this will make!" be assured you will never make a nice sketch of it. You may think you have produced a beautiful work; nay, perhaps the public and many fair judges will agree with you; but I tell you positively, there will be no enduring value in what you have thus done. Whereas if you think of the scene, "Ah, if I could only get some shadow or scrawl of this to carry away with me, how glad I should be!"—then whatever you do will be, according to your strength, good and progressive: it may be feeble, or much faultful, but it will be vital and essentially precious." (paragraph 13, pg. 8)

This passage about the virtue of painting and how spirit must be infused in the work you create is more than just limited to painting landscapes, but really is about all creative endeavors.

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unabridged electronic version of Lectures on Landscape
unabridged audio version
additional electronic books by John Ruskin

More organizing went on this week...

On Tuesday's I attend class all day {9:30am to 6:30pm} and usually I am beat by the end of the day, this week after having a quick dinner I was eager to dive in and begin giving reason and method for how I store my supplies. The organization process continued onto today with the main brunt of the work being completed on Wednesday.

{clear glass, blue and green bottles and vases, and shop towels}

Next to my desk I moved in a simple book shelf to house the variety of clear and colored glass bottles I have been collecting over the past few years. I am also keeping an incomplete portrait on its top shelf to remind me that I need to get back to this painting and finish it.

This year I began to gather tin cans as containers for holding paint brushes and palette knives, I have also found they work great for holding solvent when I do not want to use the silicoil jar. The nearby drafting table has become a still life stand.

{under the window}

Another shelf full of various dishware and bottles, including my brown bottle collection which has the two Chimay bottles from my last day of work as an architect lunch! That had to be the best day of my life, saying goodby to a career that had always been an emotional struggle to enjoy and embarking on my new life as a full time artist!

My taboret is from the container store and it has rolling wheels making it a lifesaver because of its flexibility.

{the big shelving unit in the back of the studio}

This is what took up most of my time this week. I took everything off of this Ikea shelving unit and started from scratch, before sorting all the items, every shelf was overflowing, and I had a lot leaning against the front of it also. When things get disorganized, you need more space. I decided to sort the shelves by what they hold and to also assign shelves to what canvas size will fit. This helped me condense some of the shelves to free up shelves for the future. {I added specific notes to this photo on flickr}

On the far left shelves are binders dedicated to tear sheets, printed out open source books, and other art reference materials. I prefer to read things on paper and to highlight important and pertinent ideas, so the more important websites will sometimes get printed out for future reference and then are stored in these binders.

Here are a few links to what is in the binders:
. Painting in France
. Elements of Drawing
. Drawing and Engraving
. Water and Light
. Handprint

Inspiration from Friends and Books

Yesterday I had the pleasure of catching up with one of my facebook friends over lunch. Margaret and I met more than two years ago in Mexico, she was managing the small hotel we stayed at while attending a wedding. That was when I was still practicing architecture and was only dreaming of someday, maybe someday, I would be able to be a full time artist. It turns out that she was also dreaming of someday dedicating her life to being a full time writer.

It is wonderful to reflect that two years later we are following our dreams and each have a creative career. She pursuing her love of writing in the form of an extended road trip around the US with her dog Rennie {her blog flitflitter chronicles her meanderings}.

During lunch we spoke about a lot of things, what we had been doing for the past few years, where she was headed next, and how to hold onto the creative process in a culture that is so product oriented. We both are dedicated to producing work, however I know I find it elusive sometimes, especially when I have been working on a specific piece for a bit and realize that I just need to scrap it and start over again. The willingness to scrape down and start over enables exploration and the chance that an idea may work out with wonderful results. However for all the times when the idea does not work out can be discouraging and sometimes scary. Rationally I know that the additional experience gained while exploring the unknown feeds future endeavors and reinforces that those failed attempts were not wasted time and effort, but instead just part of the process, though at times it can be tough. It was especially heartening to learn the Margaret sometimes faces this dilemma as well, reinforcing that this is an important characteristic of leading a creative career.

After lunch we stopped by a nearby used bookstore. She picked up one of my favorite Alain de Botton books and I got a book of essays and one on still life.

Here are some photos from the still life book that I find particularly interesting. I love how styles in still life change from time to time, however fundamental elements remain the same. Like the love of pairing like objects to create pattern and rhythm.

Pencil Drawing and Reading

No paintings to share this week as I spent the weekend drawing and reading. I spent most of my weekend reading time with Harold Speed's The Practice and Science of Drawing. I was inspired how he encourages art students to focus on building technical skills of "searching accuracy" found in many academic drawings. So once the technical aspects of art making are firmly under control, the artist can respond with greater freedom and spontaneity when the creative inspiration hits.



Not really feeling like painting I decided to draw instead, deciding to complete some assignments that involve pencil rendering. I feel it is an area that needs some help and over 2009 I want to improve and get more balanced in my skill set. Over the weekend I went through 3 assignments in Ernest W. Watson's Course in pencil sketching: Four books in one.



The assignments seem to be a lot of repeating a drawing 3-4 times, experimenting with rendering techniques and learning with each one. As an asside, I typically do not like drawing delapidated buildings, some people find these quaint, but being an architect I hate seeing buildings not being maintained. Most of the images that are assignments are of falling down and abandoned buildings, so these exercises are really about following through and learning even from situations that may not capture my soul and interest me. Oh well, I did learn a lot with the three windmill drawings above, the lower right hand corner drawing was my last.

Two Shallots Still Life & Making Color Sing

Two Shallots – 6" x 8" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

Yes, sometimes my food will begin to grow before I use it. This happens most often in my kitchen with potatoes and ginger root. Needless to say I was somewhat surprised by the green coming out of my shallot. It was a happy surprise, as they created a very picturesque duo.

I am particularly pleased how everything in this painting came together ~ the process, color theory, and outcome ~ to create something that I am proud of. (I am about to dive into the geek aspects of painting and the little gifts of happiness that makes painting such a joy in my life…) To play off the vibrant red/violet of the skin, I shifted the background to be more of a cool gray/green. Cool temperature colors pervaded the setup, so to offset that and to bring in some warmth I infused warmer colors into the shadow areas. Warm color temperatures are emphasized especially in the reflected light. I really love how playing off the warm/cool color temperatures of a painting can really get some legs and become more visually stimulating.

Prior to painting with oils, I did some watercolor painting. Watercolor is beautiful however all of my pieces ended up being overworked and rather drab. Because I like to read and investigate, I initially turned to researching why this was happening. I read many books on theory, technique, and materials to get a better understanding. From this experience I came away with a pretty extensive knowledge of pigment properties, and knowing the techniques, but not being so adept at applying them when painting with watercolors. However the one thing I did come away from this period of extensive inquiry is a firm belief in the importance of understanding color theory and learning to apply it in your composition. The one book I keep on going back to read, is Jeanne Dobie’s Make Color Sing. This is a watercolor book, however I find many of the color theory principles can be applied to oil as well. I will occasionally read one of her chapters, and purposefully apply the main message to a painting or two to see if I understand it, if not I will go back re-read that chapter and try again. Chapter 30 “A Personalized Light – Changing the Light Pattern” in one chapter I go back to all the time and will sometimes find ways to work out examples of it in my mind. The message still eludes me, but like any quest I will continue on. One day I will go through the entire book and try out each of the principles, and record the effects. That is one of many goals I have, I guess when time is more plentiful, maybe it will occur then...

I am very interested in learning what books do you really enjoy and find helpful? Please leave a comment so I may learn more about them. Thanks, Liz

Lemon with a Jar Still Life

Lemon with a Jar – 8" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

Last week I read Taking the Leapby Cay Lang, and in the introduction she encourages you to keep a visual diary. This is a little different than just keeping a sketchbook in that it is a means for discovering your mission as an artist, the inner voice that defines what inspires and drive you to create art.

Here is her description: “every night before you go to bed, write or sketch three ideas for your art in your journal. Don’t make a big production out of this. It doesn’t have to take an hour; sometimes five minutes is all you will feel like giving to it. The ideas don’t have to be good ones, and you don’t ever have to follow through on making them. You just have to imagine them and write them down, or make a sketch if you like. The point is to bring attention to your work, and to notice the ideas that occur. Within a short time, a week or two, a pattern will begin to emerge…. Pay close attention to these ideas. This is your heart speaking.” Pg. xvii

I feel the repetitive actions of painting and posting on this blog is helping me focus as an artist. Last year I happened to take a still life painting class and really fell in love with this genre. Since then I have been mainly painting still lifes, though I would not consider myself just a still life artist, as I also enjoy plein air and figurative work as well. However this painting just came into being from a random placement a few items set on the model stand while I was trying to get to an item that was behind the jar. From the random placement, I found something interesting, I liked the way the jar reflected and dissolved in front of the purple cloth, and then the yellow lemon also caught my interest. This painting was just the result of random actions, though to me it also has the quietness I love in paintings.

As of now, I am not sure if I have found my mission as an artist, however am learning that I truly enjoy the experience of finding a quite moment with simple items and recording them.