Why'd It Have to be Snakes?

Above the Arroyo

   

Each of us has pet peeves, things we would rather not ever have to deal with. I am reminded of the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where they finally open the tomb and the floor below is moving. Indian Jones rolls away from the entrance and says, "Snakes. Why'd it have to be snakes?"

      Well, this morning I had to face my worst case scenario. Wind. Why'd it have to be wind? I have painted in the snow, the rain, when it was freezing at 12 degrees and when the sweltering heat radiated off the sidewalks. None of those environments can stopped me from painting. But the wind I can't take. It isn't often that there are large billowy clouds in Southern California, so despite the cold wind, I painted a lot of information on the canvas before I finally packed up to leave. I managed to capture the morning light with good values, achieved a sampling of the local color and blocked in all the shapes. When I got home it was relatively easy to complete the painting in the comfort of my studio.

    I apologize to the Thursday painting group for leaving before the critique at lunch but why jump into the snake pit when you don't have to. The group always comes up with wonderful locations to paint and this was no exception. The home where we painted is on the cliffs above the Arroyo Seco with views of the Pasadena City Hall and the Pasadena Bridge. It is a lovely sight with the San Gabriel Mountains in the background.

February News

Sharon Weaver's News  
Issue: 12002                               Date: February 13, 2012

Follow Your Heart       Being the shortest month of the year, February comes storming into our lives in the depth of winter. But the month is unique because every four years it somehow grows an extra day. This fantastic gift of more time happens this year. One extra day may not seem like much but how often have you wished, "If only I had more time." Well this year you do, so do something amazing. Share it with someone you love, try something new, volunteer, do something unexpected, and whatever you do, do it with all your heart.   Monterey Harbor Revisited: Reflections in the Harbor      Reflections in the Harbor   As I finished Reflections in the Harbor, I started to consider what was it about this location that made it special? My original study was painted and sold last year during the Carmel Art Festival but I decided to revisit the spot because the place kept haunting me. Looking at photos of my study, I could smell the briny ocean, hear the sea lions barking to each other and feel the crisp morning air. The place transcended time and I was transported back to Monterey Harbor.   You can see the original study and order prints of Harbor Reflections here. I will soon be painting again in the Carmel area. It is an endless source of inspiration where I have created some of my most memorable paintings. "How to Paint Realistic Reflections" Cathedral Rock Reflection Learn how to paint reflections in water at a demonstrating I will be giving for the Glendale Art Association on March 14. I love painting water with all its varied forms. For this demonstration, I will show how to block in the shapes with complementary colors, achieve depth, apply highlights and other insights into painting water. I hope to see you at the Brand Library at 1601 West Mountain Street in Glendale, CA 91201 on March 14 starting at 7 PM.

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From Failure To Success

     High Sierra Snow 11x14 $700

    
      Have you sold any of your paintings? More than one? Good, because I have a story to tell you about how the fickle finger of fate can turn failure into success.

      There is an artist. This artist struggles to express his inner thoughts through his paintings. But the work of this artist is not received with enthusiasm by art critics and is rejected by galleries and collectors alike. In fact, he only sells one of his paintings. Luckily, this artist has a younger brother who is devoted to him and who supports him, allowing the artist to pursue his life's work.  Only two years after the younger brother is married to Johanna, tragedy strikes. The artist is killed. All his work is taken in by his brother but fate has another nasty trick and only six months later the younger brother of the artist dies as well.

      Johanna is grief stricken at her husbands death. She is surrounded with the artwork of her dead brother-in-law and then finds a desk drawer full of hundreds of letters, a correspondence between the artist and her dead husband. Her friends and family tell her to get rid of all this junk. No one wants the paintings, the letters are only sad reminders of her loss. She is still young and needs to move on. She could remarry, start over. Johanna even tries to give the paintings away to a museum, but they didn't want them either. The easy road would have been for Johanna to listen to her friends and family and give up.

      If she had, the name and work of Vincent van Gogh would be forgotten. Instead Johanna van Gogh-Bonger dedicated her life to promoting Vincent's art. She organized art exhibitions to show van Gogh's work, paying for it through the estate left by her husband, Theo van Gogh.  She organized and published those letters in a book in 1914, The Letters of Vincent van Gogh. Publication of the letters helped spread the compelling mystique of van Gogh throughout Europe and the world. As they say, "The rest is history."

      Some argue that 90% of all art is destroyed, melted down, painted over or thrown away. The artists agony and struggle are largely forgotten. Could van Gogh have guessed his legacy? He died as a failure, not knowing the future. So artists everywhere take heart. If you have sold more than one painting you are way ahead of Vincent van Gogh. Let's just hope you have a Johanna somewhere in your family.

      Thank you to John Paul Thornton for telling this story at the Valley Artist Guild luncheon.

Learn from a Critique

Morning Light Through the Trees

6x12 Oil on Panel

A group of artists gather together to paint on location. It happens all over and you probably have a group in your town. Every Thursday, I know I can join a supportive, talented and generous group of painters in the beautiful area around Pasadena, California. I have painted off and on with the San Gabriel group called "Thursdays En Plein Air" for a few years but haven't been out lately so this last week I met up with the troupe at Cobb Estate in the San Gabriel Mountains of Altadena.

The early morning light was creating lovely shadows and soft pastel colors suffused the surrounding mountains. I painted with about 25 other artists and afterward there was a critique. If you have never had the benefit of listening to a critique from an artist you admire, you are missing out on a great learning experience. It takes a certain amount of humor combined with honesty to deliver both the positive and the negative sides to each painting. If done with equal amounts everyone leaves feeling inspired to push forward and come back for more. Although each artist is at a different stage of development in their craft, everyone is eager to improve. I always leave with positive feedback.

This group is very successful and attracts dozens of artists every time they meet largely due to the wonderful people who contribute their time to make every outing worthwhile. I am impressed with the selfless dedication of everyone involved. You may not have a large group like this but every group will have different benefits. Try the critique too. If you are a small group critique each others work. If you paint with a larger group take turns each week. Every opinion is worthwhile but it is your choice as to which opinion you follow. Very early in my career I was naïve enough to believe that I knew it all. The real problem was that I didn't know enough to realize how little I knew. It wasn't until I started to grow that I came to understand the nature of art. There is always something to learn. Don't settle for the next level. Push through to ascend even farther on your artists path.

Copy Better than the Original?

Another Mona Lisa

The Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci has never been one of my favorite paintings. I don't get the fascination others see in her eyes. I've been to the Louvre in Paris, where crowds always surrounded her and, sorry, still don't love it. Lately, the iconic image has been the focus of attention when a copy was discovered. Well, the copy wasn't discovered since it has been around for a long time but the background was covered with black paint so that seems to have disguised its importance until two years ago. Despite the obvious differences in the portrait, the skill of the copy should have made someone take a closer look at this wonderful copy earlier but no. It seems a genius finally thought to X-ray the painting and sure enough under the black paint was the same familiar background landscape as on the original Mona Lisa.

Now there is speculation about who and why the second portrait was painted but the best guess is that it was a teaching lesson for one of Leonardo's talented students. They think it was painted side by side when the original was done. The experts removed the varnish and black paint so now we can see a painting which is how the Mona Lisa must have looked shortly after it was painted.

"You can imagine that this is what the Mona Lisa looked like back in the 16th century," Finaldi from the Louvre Museum said.

Maybe that is why I like the copy better. What do you think?

Gotta Paint

At the end of last year my friend Marian Fortunati and I got into a discussion about the state of the state of California. I mentioned that I had noticed a lot of out-of-state license plates and that it seemed Los Angeles was experiencing an influx of people moving from other states. Marian said that the state was loosing population, not gaining. I checked with a few statistics and sure enough Marian was right. In the beginning of last year the Golden State did loose population with more moving out than moving in but I kept seeing all those out-of-state plates. I figured I'd wait until after the holidays but even then I still saw so many. OK.... so I became completely obsessed with this and decided to print out a list of all the states and see how many of the fifty states I would see in a month. Was this a trend or was I crazy.

The results are in and I have seen license plates of 42 out of 50 states around my home in Los Angeles during the month of January. I also saw Alberta, Canada. The eight states that I am missing are Delaware, Hawaii, Louisiana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and West Virginia. It seems that people are coming to LA, with a lot of them moving into my neighborhood. I have gotten very good at recognizing various states. For instance, Wyoming has a bucking horse with rider on theirs, Maine has a pine cone and Florida has oranges. I know doing this was silly but I had a lot of fun too. The only thing, did I prove I am crazy (because I did this ADD thing) or did I prove I'm not because I did see so many states. The good news is I am finally over a sinus infection and will be going out to paint plein air tomorrow.

Why Does a Painting Sell?

Strawberry Fields

Figuring out why a painting sells can be very helpful. What element distinguishes an image from others and then connects with a client? Is it the color, the subject, or some intangible emotion you feel when viewing a work of art? Last night, at the California Art Club "Iconic California" reception I sold two paintings. This started me to thinking about why those two paintings sold and what was my vision as I painted them. Was there something unique about them that led to the sales.

"Strawberry Fields" was painted from a photo I took in Carmel at the 2011 Carmel Art Festival. While searching for subjects to paint the next day for the plein air event, I drove by workers in a field. I only stopped to take a photo but several people rushed over telling me I couldn't take pictures. I let them know that I was just an artist, not someone who could get them in trouble, but they where remained adamant. I had to leave. Needless to say, I found other scenes to paint for the plein air event but I didn't forget about the workers I had seen in the strawberry field. In the short time that I observed them, they had made an emotional connection with me, so when I returned home I decided to do a painting from the one photo I had taken before being run off.

I loved how the painting evolved but not everyone felt the same way about it as I did. My husband told me he liked it but admitted he didn't think it would sell. Having a strong feeling for the piece, I disagreed. I didn't just see workers in a field but I could sense the farmers love for the land, the solitude of the workers and the eternal struggle for survival. This little painting had captured the feel of the place and I was thrilled that someone had been moved by my painting too. Sharing a fundamental emotion with the buyer through my work is the ultimate achievement.

My job, as an artist, is to see the extraordinary in the everyday, to see the beauty in the common place. The solitary farm workers among the regimented rows of strawberries evoked a strong emotional connection with me. That emotional link lingered long afterward and I called upon that connection when I painted. The scene was both beautiful and simple, the design distinctive and familiar but, I am convinced, it was the emotion I transferred to the canvas that sold the painting.

High Sierra Snow, Along the Kern River, and Orange Grove in the Late Afternoon are still available at the California Art Club "Iconic California" Exhibition at the Altadena Town & Country Club. The show remains open through May 15 and paintings can be purchased through the California Art Club.

Altadena Town & Country Club

2290 Country Club Drive

Altadena, Ca 91001