Dear Subscribers, Greetings. |
I recently finished a new painting for an upcoming show at Robert Lange Studios. The show is called "Seeds Of Inspiration" and the concept is that each artist paints a small study and then creates a larger corresponding work. Truth be told, I almost never make small studies before starting a new painting (possibly to my detriment?). For larger figure paintings I usually mock up a preliminary composition in photoshop, but other than that, the image of the final painting is partially in my mind, and partially a result of the evolving painting process, which I find very exciting. If I knew exactly where I was going, I'm not sure I'd enjoy painting. However, I will acknowledge the usefulness of painting a small study for a larger work. After this experience, I might actually be a convert. I might always do a study now. But time will tell :). Here is a picture of both large painting and small study:
|
First off, let me tell you that I had 4 failed concepts/starts before I was able to begin this painting. I tell you that because I KNOW it is encouraging for other artists to hear it. I myself have been heartened by the harrowing tales of other painters' creative difficulties...it helps to provide some much needed perspective. This is a very lonely profession, which suits me, but it can be a heavy weight when hours turn into days and days become weeks of work that bear no fruit. It feels like waste, although, intellectually, I know it is valuable and necessary.
Eventually I had something. One of my favorite paintings ever is Thomas Moran's Green River Cliffs, Wyoming. To my eyes, a painting can't get much better than this. I have been inspired by this and the several other similar paintings that Moran created, but now I wanted to finally make a sort of homage.
Here is where the beauty and utility of AI comes in. Not having personal access to photograph the type of landscape I wanted reference for presented me with some options: Use someone else's photography and track them down for permission and compensation; use Moran's paintings themselves as reference (they are public domain); OR create wholly unique reference with the help of AI. I went with the last option. There are some interesting layers to this. Well, I think it's interesting, lol. I've been creating Ai-assisted digital works over the past 2 years. One of them was this, which I published and sold as an NFT: |
"Searching For Signs From Heaven" |
This digital artwork was created in 2021 by training an AI model on a database of hundreds of my oil paintings (using RunwayML), then generating many outputs until I had some interesting results, then combining/collaging several of those iterations using photoshop and other digital tools to create a finished piece. |
I selected Searching For Signs From Heaven and used AI (Midjourney) to blend it with Moran's Green River Cliffs, Wyoming. Quite a few hours were spent in this stage, trying to find results that would be useful for me as reference. Something enticing to me about this process is the fact that each result is wholly unique--nobody could ever get the exact same results. The incredible potential of AI. Here is a sampling of some raw outputs generated by AI from the two artworks:
|
Eventually, I found some shapes and compositions that had potential, and cobbled together a mock up in photoshop. I integrated a photo reference purchased from excellent art model Mariana Marin (@mar_artmodel on IG). It was actually a standing pose, but the lighting was perfect when turned sideways, and the falling hair turned into windblown hair. Then I began painting the small study on a 5x6inch panel:
|
An early stage above and the finished study below. To my shock, the study took 2 weeks. There's a lot of paint gobbed on there. But surely this ended up saving me a ton of time on the larger painting. I was able to experiment and solve some problems much faster on the small study. |
Then I began the larger painting. This is a 30x36in panel. In the past, I've lightly gridded out larger paintings to save time in blocking in a figure's proportion. This time I just went for it--I wanted to be free. At this stage I'm using a large crappy flat brush (it's actually an old watercolor brush) and it was enjoyable. I have often poo-pooed flat brushes and espoused the superiority of filberts for oil paint, but now that I'm old, many of my dogmatic beliefs about painting have begun to crumble:
|
Next stage. I created that diagonal shadow across the cliff face with the idea that there are clouds somewhere making that shadow. I just like how it isolates the light: |
Next stage. Developing the figure and face: |
Next stage--Experimenting with cliff-y forms, refining the figure. It's at this point, when the figure is almost done, that I made a shift in my process, and wrote about it for IG:
"In the beginning, observation is everything. It can take you very far. And then, eventually, I think it might be the death of creativity. At least, that’s how I’ve begun to feel. Let me speak only for myself, since every artist must take a different path. Over the past several years, a particular feeling has periodically come and gone, and then most recently, after returning from the LA Art Show, it came back with a vengeance. A feeling of dread and boredom that came from painting from reference..any reference at all. A need to be… totally free. But how does a representational artist create without reference? When do you know enough to trust yourself? When in a painting should you stop observing life or reference entirely, and start exclusively observing your own creation, and making decisions based entirely on the painting itself? That’s exactly what I’ve done for the past week. After getting the figure in this painting to a satisfactory level (awesome model @mar_artmodel ) , I ditched ALL my references. I put away my small preliminary painting, my photo references, my ai references, and my photoshop mockups. Now every time I reach a point that I would normally defer to observing reference, a take a leap of faith, and I trust myself. I do what needs to be done to improve the painting. I’ve never been much of a landscape painter—I simply haven’t put in the hours—not like I have with still life. With still life, I can paint many different things, materials, textures, and lighting situations from memory and experience. Landscape is largely still a stranger to me. But I do know things about color. I know some things about perspective, light, and shadow. I know edges and brushstrokes. Most importantly, I know what I like. Or at least, I know what I think I might like. It may not be realism, it may not even be good, but it sure feels like painting. That’s the only way I can describe it. Instead of making a painting OF something, I’m making a Painting. I might never paint the same way again, but only time will tell. Current thoughts, subject to change, as always."
|
Next stage. I was painting without the psychological burden and constraint of reference, and it felt amazing, challenging, and free. It's made up, and as a result, the landscape does not look like nature. More like memory, or echoes of reality, or a dream. And that felt good and right to me. |
And the finished painting: |
You Are Boundless (30x36in oil on panel, 2023)
|
You can view the high-resolution image HERE :) |
SEEDS OF INSPIRATION Exhibition begins on May 5th, 2023 |
Inquiries please contact Robert Lange Studios HERE. |
TOWNSEND ATELIER Chattanooga, Tennessee
STILL LIFE COMPOSITION AND PAINTING November 3-5 (3 days) $535 |
Thank you for reading. The next newsletter will be all about the new abstract paintings I've been working on. Yeah, fully abstract. Some thoughts and epiphanies that will change my painting practice forever. Seems like I've been having a lot of that lately.... Until then, best wishes to you -David |
|
|
|
