Some Other Thoughts on Art

I measure everything while painting. It’s by pure habit, like looking both ways when crossing a street. My first few touches on paper or canvas are spot on. They are the foundation for the rest of the work. Standing back from a work is necessary in judging design and values Spend enough time with your art and it will honestly start reflecting you…your individuality.

When painting a portrait I don’t think anatomy, I think shapes. It’s the same thing when painting everything on Earth. Shapes are the answer. Shapes!

When I’m after a likeness, I don’t put in all the wrinkles and blemishes. Perhaps a few where they are necessary in pushing the character. Look at all the great portraits and you will see they are simplified within artistic reason except when the artist is noted for intense detail. It’s important to know what to simplify in a painting, and what to push its aesthetic limits.

We should bring that bravery we had with our childhood art to what we are no creating. No holding back.

I didn’t get into art for the money. I remember starting my career thinking I’d be working in a lonesome, rundown attic. Just like artists characterized in films. That’s how my first years went. My inner strength was knowing I was on the absolute right pathway. When observing a subject or to draw or paint, we must look at it as if for the first time. Even a subject we might have drawn many times. Look at it over and over again, with curiosity as it’s one of a kind. You want to own it visually. These moments can happen fleetingly but very seriously. A good drawing or painting has the very essence of the subject but as I continue to say, reveals the artist.

When I’m painting a specific subject, I put more detail into the center of interest. I emphasize, along with slightly more contrast in value and stronger color. I’m saying this in simple terms. Look at some of the great Russian artworks of the early 1900s. See how those paintings direct your observation. I’ve been to Russia and seen the originals. They totally took charge of my eyes.

An extra fun challenge can be had when we light our subject different. Straight over the subject, underneath, lighting from both sides. This immediately refreshes and pushes the creative side of the mind. Remember, a work’s strong design can be the difference between quite good and a masterpiece. In our art world, there’s always plenty of room waiting for great.

Here, I’m officially making a request to those in interplanetary stations. I would like to be the first artist sent to a planet with a living creature and while I am there I’d like to portray them. I promise to show in detail the trip, the meetings and step by step of such portraits. You have my word. A generation from now, the culture communities will be skeptical in what today’s art world has been trying to visually “reveal.” There’s no one now who can come close to understanding what that future art world will bring to itself.