Artist Daily Videos : how to paint

Studio Landscape Painting with Mitchell Albala--Part 4

bberlin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:45:14 GMT

At my April 2011 exhibition at Lisa Harris Gallery, I gave an hour-long presentation on my "In Sunlight" series. This was a special opportunity for artists and laypersons to get a "studio perspective" on my creative process for landscape paintings executed in the studio. One of the key lessons is the proper use of photographic reference. Paintings should never look like the photograph, but only be used as a launching point. I alter the original reference, severely cropping and inventing color combinations. I also discussed how I synthesize compositions into a few simplified shapes, handle paint texture to augment spatial illusion, and work with color strategies.

The painting series experiments with alternative ways to capture the illusion of natural light. In many paintings (discussed in Video 2), I almost completely abandon traditional value relationships in favor of saturated colors, modulated primarily with subtle hue and temperature differences. You can read more about the development of this series in three posts at my blog, Essential Concepts of Landscape Painting, and see the whole series of paintings at my portfolio site.

Video 1 covers the paintings Snow Rivers in Half Light and Pinnacle Peak, Last Light.

Video 2 covers the quartet of brilliant "yellow" paintings for which the series is named.

Video 3 covers the paintings Upper Ridge in Snow, Upper Ridge at Dusk, and White Space.

Video 4 covers the paintings December Peak and Ascent, followed by a Q&A session.

--Mitchell

Mitchell Albala is the author of Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice (Watson-Guptill, 2009).

Studio Landscape Painting with Mitchell Albala--Part 3

bberlin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:38:32 GMT

Video 1 covers the paintings Snow Rivers in Half Light and Pinnacle Peak, Last Light.

Video 2 covers the quartet of brilliant "yellow" paintings for which the series is named.

Video 3 covers the paintings Upper Ridge in Snow, Upper Ridge at Dusk, and White Space.

Video 4 covers the paintings December Peak and Ascent, followed by a Q&A session.

--Mitchell

Mitchell Albala is the author of Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice (Watson-Guptill, 2009).

Studio Landscape Painting with Mitchell Albala--Part 2

bberlin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:30:34 GMT

Video 1 covers the paintings Snow Rivers in Half Light and Pinnacle Peak, Last Light.

Video 2 covers the quartet of brilliant "yellow" paintings for which the series is named.

Video 3 covers the paintings Upper Ridge in Snow, Upper Ridge at Dusk, and White Space.

Video 4 covers the paintings December Peak and Ascent, followed by a Q&A session.

--Mitchell

Mitchell Albala is the author of Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice (Watson-Guptill, 2009).

Studio Landscape Painting with Mitchell Albala--Part 1

bberlin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 17:03:41 GMT

Video 1 covers the paintings Snow Rivers in Half Light and Pinnacle Peak, Last Light.

Video 2 covers the quartet of brilliant "yellow" paintings for which the series is named.

Video 3 covers the paintings Upper Ridge in Snow, Upper Ridge at Dusk, and White Space.

Video 4 covers the paintings December Peak and Ascent, followed by a Q&A session.

--Mitchell

Mitchell Albala is the author of Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice (Watson-Guptill, 2009).

Plein Air Color Strategies with Mitchell Albala

bberlin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 16:45:17 GMT

This short video is excerpted from a demonstration I gave at my annual plein air painting workshop in Skagit Valley, Washington. (Gage Academy of Art, July, 2010.) The video talks about painting strategies in general and gives specific examples of the analogous harmony and complementary color methods.

When working outdoors (and in the studio) landscape painters often treat color as a matching exercise. While it is certainly true that working from nature involves following nature's lead, and borrowing from what we see, successful color also involves the application of a strategy.

A color strategy is like a recipe for harmony—a set of color relationships that are proven to work well and can be used as a formula for building our color composition. Like the musician who composes in a particular key, in order to maintain certain types of harmonic relationships, the colorist relies on a strategy to maintain a cohesive relationship among the colors:

Which hues will be used?

How will they relate?

Which will dominate and which will be subordinate?

What mood will they conjure?

These are the questions a color strategy addresses. Some painters report that they follow a more intuitive approach and do not use a color strategy. That may be true, but in the end, if the painting is harmonious and successful, we will be able to find a strategy at work, whether it came about intuitively or by design.

--Mitchell

Mitchell Albala is the author of Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice (Watson-Guptill, 2009). He also hosts an educational blog about landscape painting. Find him on Facebook and YouTube.

Additional Resources:

From Landscape Painting: Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice:

Chapter 8, Light and Color - "Real Light and the Limitations of Paint", p. 104; "Use of Color Strategies", p. 105

Color Mapping with James Gurney

bberlin — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 21:02:17 GMT

James Gurney gives a great guide to Gamut Mapping. Gamut Mapping is a way for you to map out what variety of colors you are going to use in approaching your work. These colors will determine the palette you will be working with, as well as how warm or cool your colors will appear. Forward this around! Thank you James!

Painting the Effects of Light

bberlin — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 15:01:51 GMT

Here again is one of our favorite artist Scott Waddell brilliantly discussing how to paint the effects of light. This step by step understanding of painting techniques regarding light are well worth the time. Check it out

Still Life: What is the Association Factor?

bberlin — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 18:27:17 GMT

I don't want to learn how to paint from just anyone. I don't mean that snobbishly, but I know how I work and learn. I am a visual learner and I learn by doing. Hearing someone drone on and on makes me want to get up and run around the room, so my best art instructors are those who can demonstrate the oil painting techniques they want me to learn. If they are making a point about still life, I'd like to see some still life paintings as examples. Basically: don't just tell me, show me!

An instructor also needs to have her or his own point of view. I'm not interested a generic workshop experience. I want to hear about the personal experiences and original ideas from the artist I'm learning from. They also have to put me at ease, too. I'm already kind of tense about drawing and painting; I need someone to balance that.

On all fronts, oil painter C.W. Mundy is a really good instructor for me. I was on set with him when he was shooting his DVD,Mastering the Dramatic Still Life, and I found that he is funny, patient, he'll listen, and then he tells you what you need to know. But most of all he's got his own ideas.

C.W. has developed what he calls the "7 Foundational Truths" of painting. He says one of those truths is the "Association Factor," and that is what this featured clip from Mastering the Dramatic Still Life is all about.

Enjoy!