Charles Muench Workshop

by Armand Cabrera

                                Bend in the River            12 x 16                   Oil on Linen


I wanted to share a great opportunity with everyone. My friend Charles Muench is teaching a workshop in the Sierras this June and there are a couple of spots still available.  Charles is a highly collected and award winning artist. His solo shows have been sellouts for the last few years and he lives in the Sierras and paints in all four seasons outdoors there.

                                     Mount Ritter            36 x 30                Oil on Linen


Charles awards include an Award of Excellence from the Oil Painters of America in 1999, the Gold Medal at the San Louis Obispo Plein Air competition in 2002, Artist Choice in 2003 at Telluride Plein Air, Best of Show at Telluride Plein Air in 2006, Best of Show at the Crystal Cove Invitational in 2007,  First Place at the Joan Irvine Smith Heritage Exhibition 2008, The Collectors Choice Award at Maynard Dixon Country Show in 2005 and 2008, The Edgar Payne Award for best landscape at the California Art Club Gold Medal Show in 2010, and the Southwest Art Magazine Award of Excellence at the California Art Club Gold Medal Show in 2011, and the Irvine Museum Purchase Award at the California Gold Medal Exhibition 2012.

Hope Valley Spring Workshop

Four Day Workshop Painting the Eastern Sierra

Spring time in Hope Valley.

June 9th – June 12th

$485.00

Not only is Hope Valley one of the most beautiful places in all of the Sierra, it is also one of the most accessible. Easy walking to great scenery!

Wildflowers, snow capped peaks, and the meandering West Carson River.

Accommodations are available in Markleeville, Hope Valley, and Woodfords.

Charles will make the most of each day- demonstrations, painting, critique, and taking in the gestalt of a group of artists painting together.

E-mail Charles for deposit and reservation information, materials list, accommodations, and any questions you might have.

For more information, click here to visit Charles' website:

                         CHARLESMUENCH.COM

Spring Wildflowers in Hope Valley.

Spring snow-melt demonstration.

If you are looking for a chance to study painting with a contemporary master in a spectacular setting I highly recommend this workshop.  

Round Valley Spring   20 x 30   Oil on Linen

FREE PAINTING DEMONSTRATION

Bull Run Bluebells              16x20                       Oil on Linen

I will be conducting a painting demonstration  For the McLean Project for the Arts at the McLean  Community Center this coming Friday April 27 from 10:45Am to 1:30 PM. The demonstration is open to the public.

 

The address For the McLean Community Center is 

1234 Ingleside Avenue, McLean, Virginia.

info@mpaart.org

 I will start and finish a large oil painting from a small sketch painted outdoors. If you are in the area come on by and watch and ask questions about the painting process or the business side of being a professional artist. Last time we had quite a turnout with over 75 people showing up.

Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale

by

Armand Cabrera

Eleanor Brickdale was the youngest child of a barrister. She began her formal study of art at 17 enrolling in the Crystal Palace School of Art and then the Royal Academy School in London. In 1894 her father was killed in an alpine accident and the family moved to Kensington. She began exhibiting at the Royal Academy in the black and white section starting in 1896 and won a prize for her painting, spring in 1897. That same year she had a feature in The Studio on her work.

The prize money from her award let her concentrate on larger paintings for the Royal Academy shows. Her first large scale oils were shown at the RA in 1899. That same year she illustrated Sir Walter Scotts Ivanhoe. In the summer of that same year she received a commission from London Gallery owners Walter and Charles Dowdeswell for a solo show of watercolors, to be delivered and paid for in quarterly installments over the next two years. The exhibition of forty five pictures opened in 1901. The show was widely reviewed and well praised and all except two paintings were sold.

Brickdale received another article in The Studio in 1901 with eight monochrome and two color pieces written by Walter Shaw Sparrow. The next year Brickdale was the first woman elected to the Institute of Painters in Oils and became an associate member of the Royal Watercolor Society.

More book commissions came in and Brickdale continued to regularly exhibit her watercolors in the bi-annual shows at the Royal Watercolor Society from 1902 and at least one oil painting a year at the Royal Academy. Dowdeswell Galleries renewed their commission for another show of watercolors in 1905. In 1909 Leicester Galleries commissioned a show of 28 works based on Tennyson’s Idylls of the King.

Brickdale and her work continued to be popular and more commissions for book illustrations and gallery shows kept her busy until 1932 when her eyesight began to fail.

Brickdale suffered a stroke in 1938 but continued to show paintings at the Royal Watercolor Society shows until 1942. Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale died in London in 1945 at the age of 73.

Bibliography

Women Artists and the Pre-Raphealite Movement

Jan Marsh and Pamela Gerish Nunn

1989 Virago Press

Bluebells demo

by
Armand Cabrera

The bluebells are starting to peak around the Piedmont here and I had to get out and paint them while they last. They usually come and go in about 10 to 15 days. My two favorite spots are at the old stone bridge at Bull Run in The Manassas Battlefield and Riverbend Park on the Potomac in Great Falls. The Bull Run patch is much smaller than Riverbend Park but provides an intimate setting within the trees along the river. The painting time for this 16x20 was two hours.


In this scene everything is backlit, the sun is low in the sky and is moving from left to right as the sun sets. In a scene like this it is important to lock in shadow patterns and stick to them from the beginning as they will change in a matter of minutes.

I establish my horizon line and big anchor points first in the correct tone and color.

My goal is to cover the entire canvas in the first few minutes to get the color and value relationships that will be constantly shifting later as I paint. While I am willing to incorporate some changes that occur later it is important not to deviate too much or the strong sense of light and shadow is ruined.

Once I have the big shapes established, I start adding elements by designing them into the scene not just trying to copy their placement.

I want to use the colors of the bluebells and there leaves and the game trail that is leading away from me to weave back through the painting breaking up the verticals of the trees and the angles of their cast shadows.

I continue to add elements and refine the larger masses of the painting.

At this point the light has changed enough that I focus on the painting looking up occasionally for information from nature to resolve any passages that haven’t been resolved to my satisfaction.

The finished painting, Bull Run Bluebells 16x20 Oil on Linen

Artistic Integrity

By Armand Cabrera

As an artist I love the process of painting. I’ve always taken an illustrative approach to my painting in that I painted anything people would hire me to paint. Commissions were a partnership entered into with the idea someone was hiring me to give them my vision of the agreed upon subject. The client’s participation stopped at the edge of the canvas and the rest was up to me. They had right of first refusal on the work but they didn’t have the right to stand over me and guide my decisions as I painted like puppet masters pulling the strings for every aspect of the art, from subject to style of execution.

Even as an illustrator or production artist I expect to be hired for my knowledge not just my wrist. I am not for hire to render someone else’s vision; it has to be a collaboration or it’s not worth my time and effort. In the last few years people seem genuinely shocked by my stance. I guess the downturn took more than money out of the economy it also took many artists self-respect with it.

I am not talking about large projects that require multiple artists to complete them like television series’, movies or games. In those instances the project style requires consistency. I’m talking about smaller projects like ad campaigns, illustration assignments or gallery work that is completed by a single artist.

I believe if you hire an artist you have a responsibility to be familiar with their work. If you want to have a painting in a certain style of a living artist, then hire that artist. Don’t hire someone to be a stand in for that artist. If you can’t afford the original artist then then hire an artist whose work you can afford but let them paint it in their own style.

I think it is our responsibility as artists and illustrators to buck this trend. Who wants to be known as the guy who paints like (fill in the blank) only at a cheaper rate? Do you even have a career if all you are is a wrist for hire by people who can’t draw and paint?

Do you agree or disagree?

Surface Quality

by Armand Cabrera

Redmond

Oil Paintings are more than just good drawing and good color and design. Often the way the paint is applied can be just as important. Once you learn the basics of representational picture making in oils it is important that your work take advantage of all the properties of the paint.

                                                                      Carlson

 

One way of achieving this is the use of paint quality and handling. Imprimatura, scumbling, impasto and glazing all add an extra dimension of interest to traditional work when applied with intelligence and forethought.

                                                                         Wyeth

 

Walk into any museum and look at a representational painting from the impressionist painters or golden age illustrators and you will see the use of all dimensions and properties of the paint at play. Nowhere was this more apparent than at the Howard Pyle show at the Delaware and the concurrent N.C. Wyeth show at the Brandywine Museum. Huge areas of the total canvas rendered with nothing more than a dark imprimatura. Lights loaded with impasto, color glazed and scumbled over other colors instead of blended. In some places the raw weave of the canvas showing through all to great effect.

                                                                          Pyle

 

It’s the same for the impressionists here and abroad at the turn of the 20th century. These artists knew their materials and let the unique properties of each artists chosen medium exert itself in the image. It is this philosophy of fidelity to the paint itself that give these works so much power and beauty.

It is an important lesson to be learned, that a thing has an inherent beauty and purpose. As an artist we must be sensitive enough to recognize those qualities and use them in service of our ideas so that it complements the work and raises it beyond the commonplace.

                                                                           Monet

Jean Giraud 1938-2012

By Armand Cabrera

The French artist Jean Giraud, who went by the pen name Moebius died on March 10th 2012 after a long illness, he was 73.

I was first introduced to his work in the 70’s when Heavy Metal, the American reprint of Metal Hurlant hit the stands here in the USA. For someone raised on American comics his work was boundary stretching and beautiful. He drew like no one else and elevated comics to an adult level in theme and content. His line work was precise and seemed effortless, like Fred Astaire with a pen; you knew it was a lot harder than it looked.

He was not a super hero guy, although after modest success here in America he did draw some super hero comics for Marvel. He had an exquisite sense of design and color, a wry sense of humor and a seemingly endless well of creativity. He worked doing design for movies like Alien, The Abyss and The Fifth Element. He got his start drawing Blueberry, a western but is primarily known in America for his series The Airtight Garage and Arzach

I had the pleasure of meeting him at a show of his work in the San Francisco Bay Area in the Nineties. There were 100 pieces of art on display at the show, everything from comic pages to film design to personal work.

He was soft spoken and gracious. He seemed genuinely surprised that people loved his work and you felt he really didn’t care about success or fame and would much rather be drawing. He was an artist’s artist in that sense.

Composition

by
Armand Cabrera

Not too long ago I was given a link to another art website where someone was going on about

the rules for composition.

How’s that again? This person had 20 or so rules to avoid for bad composition. There is only one rule of composition-

You emphasize the center of interest and deemphasize the rest of the painting so as not compete with it.

Achieving that goal has no set boundaries. There is no rule about placing the elements of your painting. Rules about leading from the corner or avoiding the center of the canvas are developed by people who have no understanding of painting. They are lazy truisms by lazy painters; just like don't use black or the color blue always recedes rule or the term muddy color.

If your eye goes to a corner when you don't want it to, it’s because you haven't got a strong enough focal point, not because you have a lead in at the corner.

Sayings like, don't put something in the corner or in the center or don't divide your canvas in half, can't be rules because they can't know how the elements of the painting are organized for every possible painting.

To prove my point every painting I’ve posted goes against the truisms you hear repeated in bad art classes by incompetent teachers. Dividing the canvas in half, placing the subject in the center of the canvas, Starting a lead in with the corner, the use of black paint and don’t have vertical shapes too close to the edge of the canvas. All of these paintings are better than any of the paintings by the people handing out the advice.

A hierarchy of Forms

By
Armand Cabrera


A hierarchy of forms is an important step in representational painting. Keeping the big forms apparent after the application of details is necessary for a successful painting. Primary, secondary and tertiary forms must preserve their relative importance.

The idea for Primary forms is a simple one. At its root all forms have a base structure that shows the effects of the overall light and shape without any details. Painting this correctly gives a sense of volume and weight to everything. Seeing this imposed construction on natural objects helps nail down this effect from the very beginning of a painting or drawing and locks in the big idea for the image quickly. Often times this is overlooked for the details of an element which can ruin the significance of the object in the overall scene.



To quote Harvey Dunn, “You must make the main thing in your picture appear most important. If anyone tells me my hat is more important than my head –by God I’m taking off my hat.”

Secondary forms complement the primary form but never obscure it. An example in landscape painting would be a hillside of trees seen from a distance. The shape of the hill would be the primary form and the trees the secondary forms enhancing the character of the hill but not confusing its overall shape. It must always read as a hill. The way you would paint the light falling on the hill would be paramount and you would always subordinate the details of the trees to that effect.

Tertiary forms would be the individual trees on the hillside; you may choose to add enough details to some of these to create interest for the viewer but again they should always compliment the larger forms not obliterate them.This idea applies to anything- portraits, still life, figures or landscapes and is an essential tool in preserving the sense of solidity in your pictures.

Plein Air Article

by
Armand Cabrera


This will be a short post this week after skipping last week, I will be back to my regular schedule next week.

I am happy to announce the current issue of Plein Air Magazine (February/March 2012) has a three page article about me and my work. I was interviewed by editor-in-chief M. Stephen Doherty for the piece and it includes images of five of my paintings.

Great Falls Workshop Demo

By

Armand Cabrera

This little profile was painted on the last day of my three day workshop in Great Falls Virginia over the weekend. The class was a studio class and we had 15 people in the workshop. Everyone worked hard and hopefully came away with some new ideas for improvement.

Every day I tackled a different subject for the demos. I wanted to show that the process I teach and the color palette I use works with any motif. I limit my demos during class so students get more painting time. This was a one hour demo with some touch up at home to finish it. I usually finish things in one sitting but demos are a special circumstance and sometimes I feel the need to finish them when I’m home.

The Recruit 12x9 oil on linen

Art Shows

by Armand Cabrera



Art shows are hitting new lows these days. The worst offenders are front loaded with fees. They take money for a jury fee, a handling fee for stored shipping materials and even a hanging fee in some instances. I would never pay to hang my work, I don’t care what the venue is. These shows make their money off the fees. Many galleries now keep themselves in existence with these kinds of scams.

If you allow the show to recover all its money before the show opens then there is no incentive for the show to be promoted or to bring in collectors. Which brings me to another little scam where galleries ask for the collector lists of their artists. Never relinquish your client list to a venue. A venue that has no clients, charges you for space and doesn’t promote you in anyway is worthless to your livelihood as an artist and your career.

In my opinion there is nothing professional about these venues and you’re better off renting a public space for a night or weekend and advertising and hanging your own show or a show with a group of like-minded artists.

A lot of artists hold the opinion that it is an honor to show alongside other juried artists. Many times a gallery show will pay a nationally known artist to show at a venue from the upfront fees they collect. It’s sort of like an anchor store at a strip mall; they pull in the other stores. Big name artists are given spots or paid to show to get others to pay for the chance of showing with them. If you are juried into a show you’ve earned your spot no need to feel someone is doing you a favor or you’re lucky.

Art is hard enough, don’t let people take your money or take advantage of you. Shows need good artists good artists don’t need shows. Participate in shows that support the artists and their work and take a percentage of sales; this way the expense and work is shared by the venue and the artists.

Making a Mark

By
Armand Cabrera

Robert Henri

Brush strokes carry a message whether you will it or not. The stroke is just like the artist at the time he makes it. All the certainties, all the uncertainties, all the bigness of his spirit and all the littleness are in it. ----- Robert Henri

Joaquin Sorolla

Painting at its best is communication. A successful painting communicates to others on a personal level. The artist, to be effective, must share something of themselves to make that happen. Their art must carry truth in it. Many times people confuse the truth of a thing with its outward appearance but that is just illusion. The truth of a thing is the whole thing. Not just its how it looks to the eye, but also its character, how it makes you feel. The artist in observing the motif decides to express themselves by capturing it in paint.

N.C. Wyeth

An artist must be sensitive enough to discern the whole and to infuse his paintings with the most important aspects of the thing. This not only takes the skill to paint but the openness to understand and make decisions about the subject depicted. There is facility and thoughtfulness and insight. It is opinion manifest through their ability as an artist and it is hard work. It shuns the superficiality of affectation and artistic mimesis.

Hovsep Pushman

There is a lot of technique being thrown around nowadays. Illustrators and artists are hiding behind technology and routine copying and photographic collage. This slick surface work, lacking any personality except in the most superficial way is completely devoid of the hand of the maker. In my opinion this is artistic cowardice. To remove the artist and their opinion is to remove the art from the craft of painting. Anyone, given enough time and effort can be taught the mechanics of image making but the mechanics alone do not produce a work of art. Art can be anything and take many styles but for it to be meaningful it must always carry the mark of the artist. All great art has an individual point of view.

Dennis Miller Bunker

 

The great artists and illustrators knew this and poured their thoughts and emotions into their work at every level. They infused their work with beauty, power, passion and care in spite of personal challenges, deadlines or outside influences. These artists left a bit of themselves for all to see and in doing so made their mark on the world of art.

Harvey Dunn

There are ten thousand people in the United States who can paint and draw to beat the band. You have never heard of them and you never will. They have thoroughly mastered their craft and that is all they have—their craft… Merely knowing your craft will never be enough to make a picture… If you ever amount to anything at all, it will be because you are true to that deep desire or ideal which made you seek artistic expression in pictures---Harvey Dunn

   Isaac Levitan

Can anything be more tragic than to feel the infinite beauty of your surroundings, to read natures innermost secrets and, conscious of your own helplessness, to be incapable of expressing those powerful emotions? ----- Isaac Levitan

Howard Pyle

Project your mind into your subject till you actually live in it. Throw your heart into the picture and jump in after it….Art is not a transcript or a copy. Art is the expression of those beauties and emotions that stir the human soul. ----- Howard Pyle