Show at Bauhaus in December...

chris peters workshop this weekend...

I was lucky enough to get a scholarship to a workshop at Gage this weekend. This will be perfect for helping with some of the color/value issues I've been discovering I don't have answers to. I'm excited going to soak up as much information as I can. Here's the info for the workshop if you're interested...

Chris Peters workshop at Gage Academy of Art

Chris Peters11/21-11/22, Sat-Sun, 9:30am-4:30pm [2 days]


“Chiaroscuro”, the painter’s use of dramatic lighting, was developed by the Italian Renaissance painter Caravaggio in the 16th century, and provides the core focus of this weekend workshop.

Peters begins by discussing how to light your subject to maximize the description of its three dimensional forms. He then helps you to compose the planes within your picture into large light and dark sections with an unambiguous focus on your main subject matter. Peters pushes you to maximize the dramatic reading of your painting by going beyond a narrow range of middle values so that your intermediary areas of half-light and half-shadow areas play second fiddle to the creation of a strong overall effect. He also shows you how to use a mirror as you develop your painting to help distinguish general values from local values.

During the workshop, you create one small painting each day, working quickly and simply to "cover the canvas" by making value/color choices everywhere. Your artistic goal is to grab people’s attention from a distance and then reward them with beautiful details as they come closer to inspect your artwork, just like a Caravaggio or a Rembrandt.

lovely accidents...

Up late last night trying to work - couldn't. Just stared at my tools for awhile. Noticed they were quite pretty. Its easy to be so focused on improving on what you know - trying to develop your technical skill, or developing whatever concept you're trying to get across - its easy to forget to listen to the accidents that happen in art. Especially in realist art accidents are considered mistakes, not blessings. I love realism and want to develop my technical skill as much as I can - but I don't want to forget to bend a bit to the chaos that makes art so exciting. I don't want to get so busy trying to master the craft that I lose touch with the small voice that made me love art in the first place. Its a voice I don't think can ever be mastered or explained. I have to remember to allow my art to have enough room to breathe and to allow life to influence my work instead of spending so much time "mastering" it I end up smothering it. 

december show fast approaching...

I've been so busy trying to get this show pumped out by December 1st I haven't had much time for anything else. I only have a little over a week to go so hopefully it all turns out well. It can be very satisfying to have to work quickly on a series - it keeps me from being too precious about the work. At the same time i can tend to call parts of a painting done when it really isn't to par and needs to be worked on more. I should be able to go back over a piece later - after the show and they are back in the studio - but it never works that way. I get so sick of them after they're hung I just never want to see them again usually. Its like going back to an ex boyfriend - ugh. just doesn't work out. Usually it just gets more fucked up then it was before. So, its hard to not have the time to really work through a piece to my satisfaction.