EVERYONE'S WORK - KING'S PLACE - AUG 5th 2014

Well done, those of you who made it - let's see whether this works!  I've had some lovely work sent through, and I gather you all had a good discussion session at the end - great.  It's probably very good for you all to assess your work yourselves a bit more!

Anyway, the first to send in was PENNY, who said " I’m not sure if this is quite what you meant by “dreaming” but I have tried to draw less so the viewer has more to fill in.  Hopefully, painting will take this even further."

Penny no. 1

Penny no. 2

Penny no. 3

Penny no. 4

Penny no. 5

Yes, I suppose it's difficult to define 'dreaming'.  I suppose I would say it was leaving space for things to happen in the mind.  That's what that curve in the foreground did last time.
That's certainly what happens in no. 1 this time.  the scale is offered to us by having the figures in there, but what the context is, is very difficult to ascertain.   No. 2, 3 and 5 are all very clever, because a lot IS explained, and the viewer can feel secure as to the context.  However, there are little passages of strangeness (like the 'striplights' in no. 3), and these offer up twists in the tale, if you like.  similarly in no. 5, the figures going up the stairs (?) behind offer a strangeness - where are they going?
No. 4 is very intriguing, with that strange dark dot.
I would make the prow even less distinct.  It draws the eye so much.  Without it, or at least not so strong, there's a lovely diagonal of the horizontals going up from the boat in ever decreasing lengths.  Put your hand over the front, and see how it transforms.
Your real problem is going to come with colouring.  Especially in something like no. 1, where there's so much left unsaid.  If you use anything resembling 'local' colouring, you'll end up losing the mystery.  think instead of mood colour.  your tonal arrangements are so strong that the colour can be anything, really.
Push them further - let's see what happens.  Very nice.



Then PAT K. sent the following, and said "Today I returned to the same place with the intention of stripping away unnecessary detail and to simplify the image  I hope to take this further" 

Pat no. 1

Pat no. 2

Pat no. 3

Pat, well done.  Did you do any thumbnails first????  I am hoping so, because that was what made a difference last time.  We could read no. 1 as being a study, that leads on to no. 2, which is really lovely.  I think the thing you've really cracked in no. 2 is the tree (?) in the middle distance.  Such a lovely, integrated shape.  So different from the rather cumbersome lines in no. 1.  I really feel drawn in to no. 2, wheras in no. 1, I sit very much on the surface.

No. 3 has many beautiful parts, but I think it's a couple of paintings rolled into one, at the moment!  I think the content (the pink square and the dark marks) on the lhs and the rhs are a bit too similar, saved (just) by the flicks on the far left hand end.

It's all about balance and weight.  This is why the thumbnails are so useful first, making you more aware of where you're heading, leaving less to chance.



ELIZABETH's contribution :-   "The drawings were done in the order of Sarah 1, 2, 3 started off by looking at leaves against the water and then put in passing things on the bank opposite. The idea was of things only seen fleetingly and an impression of colour and movement against the foliage ."

Elizabeth no. 2

Elizabeth no. 3

Elizabeth no. 1

I think your aim is a lovely idea.  The trouble is that your pieces are very TONAL.  Very much about light and dark.  This doesn't allow any room for colour.  They all have the beginnings of ideas, and components that could be put together - leaves, figures, bits of the far bank.
I'm going to challenge you to do something with these which you will find difficult.  I would like you to try and do a version of one of them (or several!) where you are using COLOURS ALL OF THE SAME TONE.  We've played with this exercise before, and it's worth revisiting.  You have to keep screwing your eyes up, looking just through your eyelashes, to check the colours are the same light/dark as each other.  If you were to photocopy or photograph it in black and white after, it should come out evenly grey (except that photocopiers etc. often read some colours slightly differently).  Just try, and see what happens.  You'll have to stretch your range of colours enormously, because you won't have tone to fall back on to.  Try it - see what happens.  Bring it in next time, and we'll talk more about it.






GERALD said  "I decided to put some figures into my thumb nail sketches as I think they look sterile without some human forms.

Trying to do a few sketches before the person moved or left is, I realise, a discipline in itself and I don't know how successful it has been.

I am intending to try and combine 2 or 3 sketches into one."

Gerald no. 1

Gerald no. 2

Gerald no. 3

Gerald - these are very beautiful indeed.  I think the most successful page is no. 1.  I feel that you've made drawings which work as beautiful compositions.  Poems of light and dark.  Added to these is an unobtrusive, but essential figure.  The drawing in the top left, with a white silhouette, is really special - as is the one in the bottom right.

The subsequent sheets of studies are much more about information gathering, and understanding of how figures work (and yes, it's really difficult).  I am guessing that these are ideas that you might fuse into future compositions.

The key is just what I've said above.  Make compositions which work as such (on an abstract level), and have the figures contributing within that.  Working with colour is going to be your challenge.  Whatever you do, keep the tonal underpinning, and as I said to Penny, don't necessarily 'colour-in' with local colour.  Fabulous!

Added to all this industry, I have had contributions from Jane and Stephanie, who were not able to be at King's Place - well done both of you for sending stuff through.







STEPHANIE

"I am sending you work from a day spent on 25 July near Debden in Essex. I felt I learned a lot.  

I think it would be useful if there could be a round-robin of emails just before these days so that we could know who expects to be there.  They could just be random, to you, but copied to the rest of the group.  

No. 1.  First attempt, in front of landscape that was beautiful.    I rapidly found myself getting very wrapped up in the detail, and becoming maddened by the fact that the  tones were all the same, there was no focus and the scene did not say anything. So I went on to the scene below. Later, I came back to the painting at home, worked up the colours somewhat and put in ink additions.

So I moved on to number 2.  A very fast squiggle which suggested much more about what I was feeling about the day.   I liked this result. 
No. 3.  Finally, at home, I cooled off and reworked painting number one, by drawing into it a bit.  I then took a colour pencil sketch I had made of the view just to my left -- which was what had most appealed to me when I started out -- but of course I did not 'treat' myself to tackling it until tired --  and painted the following from memory, just keeping to the shapes and geometry of the fields and sky that had appealed to me in the beginning.  I am not sure whether it is finished or not."  

Stephanie no. 2

Stephanie no. 3

Stephanie no. 1

OK Stephanie, what a great contribution.  The main thing you need to decide, really, is which aspect of the scene fascinates you the most.  Is it the tonal 'pattern', or is it the vivid colours?  No 1. has got everything + the kitchen sink in it.  It actually works well as a landscape, but we've all seen a million like it before.  Tones popping about all over the place (especially with the exagerated modelling on the trees), and colours thumping through in competition with them.  
No. 2 is beautiful - you're right to be pleased.  Why?  Because you have reduced the colour, apart from the striking blue slash in the sky (which works predominantly as a tone), kept the modelling to the shapes to a minimum, and created a lovely landscape statement that reads firstly as a tonal composition.  Do you see the difference?


No. 3 is very impressive, as it was done from memory.  Here, the yellow and brick-red work happily side by side.  However, just be sensitive to the pattern you're making with those darks.  I've added it in here in b&w - does that pattern please you?   Well done though - really good.

Stephanie. no. 3 b&w

JANE is away, but sent these in from the previous visit we made.

Jane no. 1

Jane no. 2

Jane no. 3

Jane no. 4

Jane no. 5

Jane no. 6

I had talked to you about expanding your palette of neutral colours. I can see that you've been experimenting with them here.  The real difficulty you've got with these is that you've used that extremely vibrant blue and red in your darker areas in some pieces (eg. no. 2 and no. 4), and then the more modest colours in the lighter passages.  this tends to allow the blue and red to completely squash everything else.  However, where you have used the blue/reds in dark areas IN COMBINATION WITH darker neutrals, they can sit quite happily (eg. no. 6 and no. 1).  No. 5 is very gentle, with the pastel-coloured lights coming through against the more neutral darks, and no. 3 works as an all-over coloured piece.
The real key is in no. 1.  If you are going to have areas of the painting which are significantly different in tone (as you have done), then you need to contain the brilliant colours with some 'buffering' of something more neutral.  That's what you've done with that brilliant blue.  OR - if you want to use very vibrant colours throughout, then you need to reduce the degree of tonal contrast.  I hope you'll be there in September, and we can explore this further.

Pat W. hasn't been well since the meeting, and I know we all wish her well.  Anyway, she's now sent these in, saying :- "Rather the same as I have done before but I had hoped after seeing the Matisse cut outs afterwards I might translate the fairly stark shapes here to that medium!
Possibly the same for the gasometer.
The st. Pancras view was really from memory with the exemption of the table and chairs  added afterwards and the scale plotted in".

Pat no. 1

Pat no. 2

Pat no. 3

Super Pat!  What might be a REALLY good idea would be to actually reproduce one of these images using paper cut-outs.  Then you would really get a feel for what it would be like to work like Matisse.  There's a little challenge for you, and I know you would be brave enough to do it!

I like the starkness of no. 1 - that building has obviously got its hooks into you!  However, areas of 'fudge' have crept in.  If you were cutting it out of paper, it would just be stark shapes.  I have been cheeky enough to amend it, just to show you how that could happen.  Only then can you really SEE the shapes against each other, and how they fill the space, and talk to each other.

Pat. no. 1 - amended!

This is especially difficult where you have bits of filigree, such as the line-work on the gasometer in no. 2.  How would Matisse have dealt with this?  Put yourself in his shoes.  Think about what the picture needs to counterbalance the dark triangle in the bottom lhs.

I think this sort of exercise is very good for you, because it forces you to be more clear-thinking, which, by your own admission, you sometimes tend not to be!!

Then, having cleared your mind in a more practiced way, you can re-introduce brush/pen marks, but still keep 'areas' distinct.

So, this leads us to no. 3.  I think this is excellent, done from memory.  However, the reintroduction of local colour has led you down the 'fiddling' route, especially with the trees on the left.  I very much like the strong red brick of the spires against the hard modern structure on the right - nice idea.   The trees and figures then need to speak the same language, and ADD to your statement.

Your skills as an individual lie in the playing with shapes and colours, Pat.  Explore further the Matisse inspiration - see where it takes you.  Well done.




OK folks - brilliant!  I still hoping to get something from Pat W., but will get this to you anyway, and then add her in.

Please bring all these with you in September, as well as your subsequent work.

I hope you enjoy this - and get something out of it.  It's all there for all to share.