Illustration Construction: Part Three

Don't yet have a title for this in-process watercolor of the artist in his studio.
It's a section of one of three slightly different interiors based on the sketches of the previous two posts.  http://tomsarmo.blogspot.com/2013/06/illustration-construction-part-one.html

Took it into my head to work the same painting using three different media: Watercolor, oil, and gouache (or maybe acrylic?).  I reasoned that it would be good for me to focus for once, and believed I must finally choose a single medium in which to work. (Occasionally, self-delusion and irrationality visit my studio. They tend to hang around awhile, too.)

Some details of each prep-drawing follow.

Ended up tweaking every drawing, so they are slightly different. Sort of like that "Doublecheck" activity in Highlights magazine--sorry 'bout that.

This is a detail of the artist done on gessoed hardboard prepped for oil. It's brush and india ink.

 This one is a detail of the artist done on Crescent watercolor board, in sepia ink. Already begun to work the color  into it (see first pic above).

 This one is a detail of the artist in preparation for either gouache or acrylic (can't decide), again using india ink. (Btw, the ink has to be sealed prior to acrylic being applied.)

This is the artist's assistant (he holds the lantern-stick) in the oil painting. Good thing oils allow mistake-fixes.

This is the assistant in the watercolor version.

The assistant turned into three birds for the gouache/acrylic version. There's boredom in action for you.

It does seem a bit absurd to do a similar pic three times, but it's what I've set my mind to do.
 With many other irons in the fire, it may be awhile before these are completed. Oh well, wish me luck.

And thanks for checking in!

Illustration Construction: Part Two (and a Rough back-step)

Roughs. A few anyway.  

Sorry, I forgot about the roughs. I did about 8 for this project. These were done after the first composition sketch--the one with the words on it 

(see previous post http://tomsarmo.blogspot.com/2013/06/illustration-construction-part-one.html ) and I should have stuck them in there.

These are a combination of value and composition thinking. The initial idea is just about subject. Roughs (or thumbnails) like those above help me develop the subject into an actual scene. Roughs are crucial in finding the best solution for the scene.

I decided that the interior, not just the characters, was important to me. So I chose the second from the left for my composition, and the last one will be a reminder for the light or atmosphere.

 Somewhere along this process I began sketching face ideas for the artist. Much of the time this sort of "thinking" is done while sitting around talking with my family, not necessarily while I'm in the studio. You could say it's like letting the unconscious take over.

There were quite a few more interim sketches of this guy, too many to reasonably show. This is one I traced up to see if I liked the character.

[You can skip this paragraph if you want--it's a bit of an apology. The most satisfying "making" for me comes while thinking and sketching and dreaming--and that lazy wandering feeling is very close to sublimity. I like to draw everywhere--both on paper and in my head, and most of those drawings get lost. There's something sort of nice about the impermanence.

Finally though, a fellow has to quit the lazy part and get to work. But the methodical exertion on the drawing table is not my favorite thing, and I too often rush that part. The tough issue for me is keeping the qualities of my wander-sketching--and the joy-- in a final illustration. I hope I can do that for this particular picture.]

Anyway, here is the second stage of the drawing. The artist and helper are still wavery and uncongealed, both here and in my head. But I'm getting there.

Next up: Part Three and some color.

Thanks for staying with me on this particular journey.

Illustration Construction: Part One

Good old summer--ugh! It's my most trying, most un-stimulating season for some reason. This year, instead of fighting the annual "creative block", I went back into an old sketchbook for inspiration. Since the artist-in-studio has always fascinated me, there were plenty of sketches to look at.

These were done a great many years ago, but luckily touched off an idea; a complete studio interior with an artist fortunate enough to have an assistant. A sort of Artist Dr. Frankenstein and his Igor?

This is the first new rough, with a few notes. I like to begin a new illustration by sketching stuff out without resources. That seems to help me keep the idea open to development. Looking for resources too early tends to cement it in--not what I'm after at this stage.

This is the first composition sketch--very rough, but with the perspective worked out. Most often, I do these using a 2h pencil on junk paper. This one's been enhanced--thus the smeary look.

I started sketching ideas for the lantern and hand positions--in this case while sitting around in the living room after the studio work session.

Next post:  Part Two: The Construction Continues

Thanks for the visit!

Fleeting Thoughts

A bit melancholy, now that spring is past and the hot summer is due to begin.

Brief--I should say fleeting--thoughts of small, rich bits (like Durer's Great Piece of Turf, below) are moving around in my brain lately.

It might be because large, beautiful landscapes are escaping my notice, most likely due to the destruction of my neighborhood, and that of other places I once loved.

 A little watercolor sketch I painted on location (at a place called Onion Hill) once a long time ago.

It was much cooler and way more atmospheric than this sad little sketch shows.

Now Onion Hill looks like this. In winter. (It's not much better in the summer.)

It always amazes me that people actually choose to live in houses like these. It's an expensive development, not a slum where one might be forced to live due to economic hardship. Miles of giant black roofs that block the view of the surrounding mesas, and brown, tan, and taupe instead of a colorful old farm. Some kind of modern Gulag.

The late, great illustrator Trina Schart Hyman once wrote: 

"One spring the farm was sold, and men and machines came and tore it down. They ripped up the grand old elms and boxwoods...they smashed the old stone and stucco walls and splintered the hand-painted blue and white tiles that lined the fireplaces. They shattered the wavery-gold and violet-tinted glass of the windows. They battered it...until it finally collapsed and died: then they plowed it under with their bulldozers.  

I learned something, that day. I learned that everything changes, and nothing is safe."

The farm from the book Self-Portrait, by Trina Shart Hyman

Everything changes I guess, including (maybe) my own ideas and opinions about beauty. And nothing is ever really safe. But it wouldn't hurt my feelings to once in awhile see a new, brown suburb bulldozed to make way for an old neighborhood filled with some charm.

Talking to Myself

A page from one of my sketchbooks.

Sketches--mine (yes I look 'em over often) and those of others--fascinate me. My favorite shows at art museums are the ones that exhibit sketches. Unfortunately, not many of those happen in Denver, so while I don't get to see sketches in person, the internet provides plenty of peeks and inspiration. The variety is amazing, and the use of sketchbooks has changed quite a bit recently, as they seem to be morphing into something more finished in look--art pieces in their own right.

Not mine though. My sketchbooks are still random and thoughtless--meaning I don't think about them as finished artworks to be viewed. I use my books and my sketching as exploration of technique, as problem solving, as practice, or as a repository for the imagery that needs releasing from my head.

 

And I use them for preliminaries.

Yes that internet is great--much of the time. It provides inspiration, but also tremendous opportunities for self-doubt/comparisons. 

I admit it, I look at some of the sketchbook pages of artists and I become troubled by the roughness and absence (of what--finish, class, artistry, pure magnetism?) in my own. Ugh.

 

So part of my life as an artist entails talking to myself. Being reasonable about what I do instead of engaging in the pointless--yet somehow seductive--act of comparison.

 

The most effective words to myself?  "Get to work!"

 

So I will. 

Thanks for reading!

 

 

Arthur L. Guptill's Books

Good old (available used for now) instruction books:

The book (this one's a reprint) is an overview in a way. Designed I guess for beginners, I still check it out for inspiration. If I'm being lazy about doing study sketches, cracking it open usually gets me in the mood.

Simple and straightforward.

 

There are also a few of these masterful drawings mixed in. Admittedly bearing little relation to a modern studio, it's a great drawing to study nonetheless--just look at it! I like the text, too. Guptill's words have been often quoted or re-mixed without credit. Lots of gems here if you take the time to read.

From Guptill's Rendering in Pen and Ink, still the all-time comprehensive pen and ink guide and overall drawing manual. This book is incredible--if you only owned one of the four listed here--this is the one!

I continue to learn new things from revisiting this book. Pretty much everything an artist needs to know about drawing and rendering (not just pen and ink) is included, from value to perspective to architecture to landscape.

In addition to instruction, there are sections containing pen and ink works by masters. Again, I recommend reading the text as well as looking at the pics--don't miss out.

Guptill manages to do it all for me with this volume--technique and inspiration!

 I also have his book, Rendering in Pencil. Not being much of a graphite renderer, I don't find it as enlightening as the book previously discussed, but that's just my bias. The next book though, is indispensable if you love watercolor:

From Watercolor Painting Step-by-Step by Arthur L. Guptill.

There are a ton of expensive, slick-but-empty "how-to-paint-watercolor" books out there. Do yourself a favor--ignore most of them, find this one, and read it. You'll save some money and you won't find a better overall textbook for learning and re-discovering what watercolor's all about.

Maybe the thing I love best about Guptill is his profound knowledge yet refusal to be absolute. His writing style contains specific instruction without being dismissive of the many approaches an artist can take to make pictures. Only one example; this book allowed me to discover the use of white at a time when all my instructors were condemning that use as "not true watercolor".

I don't think any of these books are still in print, but used copies are still available on the internet. I have trouble not buying more copies of Rendering in Pen and Ink or Watercolor Painting Step-by-Step when I see them in used bookstores--have to talk to myself in order to pass them by.

Hope you found this helpful. Thanks for reading.

Leaving Home

Detail of a recent painting.

An artist's life is pretty sedate (translate to "boring except to the artist").  At least that's this artist's life.

Having some coffee, getting the dreaded social-media/internet/business out of the way, and heading up to the sanctuary of the studio.  A quick review of the previous day's work, choosing the music, and finally disappearing into the little world currently on the drawing table for the next 8 hours.

The process for this painting follows:

The door painting idea had its inception with these study sketches of boots. As I was drawing them, the picture concept jumped into my head. 

Boots to walking to traveling to leaving home. 

I guess.

 Then the concept of the door took shape and I threw out a rough page of sketches

after photographing this meticulously-devised prop.

I worked out another very rough sketch of the door character.

Then I painted the picture.

The Green Door Leaves Home. Oil on canvas, 6" x 18".

The idea of a door wrenching itself out of its frame and hitting the road pleased me quite a bit, probably because most days I really only leave my home in my head.

Thanks for reading!

 

The Good Triggers: Books for Kids

 Yeah, it's a cliche, but it's true nonetheless; books are good for kids. They were great for me. 

The above illustration is by Richard Doyle, from The King of the Golden River.

It scared me, blew me away (no pun intended), and planted the seed that was to grow into my life's work. I'd have never known about Doyle, but for the fact that a set of ten volumes of children's classics came with the encyclopedias my parents bought for my brother and me back in the 60s.

 Still have the complete set. They were a centerpiece of my life as a kid, no kidding! I'd warily approach them on the bookshelf, because, like everything that was alluring to me then, I was also very afraid of them. Many of the poems and stories terrified me.

(Check out Robert Southey's Poem, God's Judgement on a Wicked Bishop for a healthy dose of Victorian violence http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/god-s-judgment-on-a-wicked-bishop  Yep, it was included in this set, and it was one I couldn't help re-reading over and over, even though it made nighttime hell). 

The illustrations were the best part though (Tenniel's Jabberwock among 'em)! They confused my terrifically overstimulate-able brain and haunted me, but I couldn't leave them be either.

My favorite volumes.
The ones I hauled back and forth to school; the ones opened and examined so often they ended up a bit tattered. They are full of the illustrations I copied as a kid, and the ones of the set I still look at most.

 Marley's Ghost by John Leech (Still my all time favorite rendition.)

I suppose because they were aimed at children, the black and white drawings (by the original illustrators) were overlayed with color.

Illustration by John Dickson Batten

 And sometimes, kind of unfortunately, the editors made the decision to replace the black line with color. Still, the illustrators were credited, which allowed me to research them as I got older. This set of books led me to many of the greats who still influence my art now; among them, John D. Batten, W. Heath Robinson, Arthur Rackham, and L. Leslie Brooke.

He wrote, but who knew Gilbert drew little guys too?

 Those books also allowed me to fall in love with poetry--especially nonsense poetry--and reading in general.

Even the endpapers were cool, although this illustrator was uncredited.

I know lots of parents cringe at the thought of their children wanting to be artists. Luckily, mine didn't. And also fortunately, they knew the value of books--even if they didn't guess that the little, poorly reproduced drawings in this set would become one of the most exciting parts of my childhood.

First copyrighted in 1938, The Junior Classics can still be found at thrift stores.

Thanks for the visit!

Break out the Oil?

 The Green Door Leaves Home (detail of a work in progress). Oil on canvas.

Just added another love to my media list: Water soluble oil paint--in this case Winsor & Newton Water Mixable Oil Colour.

Watercolor will always be on the list, and while I love acrylics, and have indulged in them for years, they tend to frustrate me because they dry so fast on the palette.

When I began my quest for color control ( http://tomsarmo.blogspot.com/2013/01/focus-and-attention-fix-part-2-black.html )

my biggest issue became mixing up a big grey pile of acrylic for color strings, and then having it all dry while I looked for a resource, fed the dog, or rummaged in the fridge. Scooping the paint into (so-called) airtight cups and storing those in baggies with wet paper towel kind of put me over the edge.

I am sure that a quicker brain (and slow-dry medium) would have helped, but my need for smarts proved unnecessary when a friend gave me a set of water soluble oils.

 They can be used over acrylics, they dry slowly enough for me to experiment, and they don't stink up my little studio space with solvents. 

Still life in progress

 Detail of still life in progress Oil on canvas.

Maybe I will stick with these oils exclusively, maybe not. Ambivalence strikes again. 

I've pretty much accepted that as my lot, so I'll roll with being decisively uncertain. And enjoy the daily medium-of-choice, whatever it will be.

As always, thanks for the visit!