Our tax preparation is 99% done, my nursing duties for my husband's shoulder surgery are tapering off and I have a show deadline to meet. Time to get back to painting.
An ongoing challenge for me is to make my work more minimal - the essence of a scene, not the detail. I like the idea of engaging the viewer to make the scene their own - using their imagination or experience of a place to complete my areas of suggested trees, a pond, or wild flowers. How few strokes can I make to say what I need to say?
A month ago I quoted from William F. Reese's book, The Painter's Process. Tonight I opened the book again and found exactly what I needed (funny how that works). "Simplicity requires greater knowledge and more time. It takes a great writer to say more with less. The same is true of artists. Editing is what art is all about." And, advice in yesterday's posting by Richard McKinley in his Pastel Pointers: "The novice paints the leaves; the master suggests the tree." This week, I'll be working with those words in mind.
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2 comments:
That is so true, Barbara. I think most all of us struggle with that one, I know I do!
"The novice paints the leaves; the master suggests the tree." I love that!
BTW, my mother, Mary Balcomb, wrote the Reese book. You can also see her Bongart book featured in my magazine below. Click on ART, and you'll find it under her name. You may have also seen her show of etchings at the Frye.
Stuart Balcomb
aka Vail
TheScreamOnline.com
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