DESIGN AND COMPOSITION TACTICS

I FOLLOW MY INSTINCTS: From capturing images for possible paintings, to working with images in Photoshop, to choosing size and aspect ratio to crop the image, to choice of paints and colors, to where to start on a painting I follow my inclinations. My experience is that subject matter, design decisions and color choices arise from that mysterious place where art finds its origins.

I NEED FOR THERE TO BE LIGHT: It feels like I have a light meter in the center of my chest. (I’m sure I’m not alone in this.) I feel the response in my body when I see the kind of illumination that is worth painting. It’s as if I am surprised by the sight of it. I can be backlight, or sidelight, but when it’s not there, it’s not there. Since I spend many hours working on a painting, I need to be really taken by its light.

THE IMAGE IS MY SERVANTI AM NOT ITS SLAVE: There are vastly differing opinions about the use of photography in representational art; I hold it as an integral stage of my process. I have a journalist’s brain, rather than a fiction writer; I can’t “make it up” to save my life! I must witness. The camera captures, to the best of its abilities, the shapes, values and colors that caught my attention when I was out in the world for me to make a painting in the studio. Before I paint something, I zoom way in and scan the image to see it intimately. If I don’t fall in love with the shapes and colors, I won’t spend my time painting it.

I DON’T FOLLOW “RULES” OR USE SPECIAL TECHNIQUES: I never use black, neutral tint or Payne’s grey and other pre-mixed darks. I don’t have a “formula” for making shadow colors.i mix and layer all colors for maximum richness and interest. I don’t use specialized brushes, salt, alcohol or other objects to create textures in my paintings. I just paint with various sizes of round brushes and do my best to paint what I see and respond to the results I get, adjusting, adding, as I go.