Speaking of Art Blog

I like a challenge.  I get bored with the same old, same old.  So every once in a while I like to try something new with my artwork and rattle my own cage.  Experimenting stretches me, and it also sometimes opens up whole new creative paths for me.  In 2017 I decided to try something new with how I went about rendering a dunes scene.  I was tired of the same old way of making the Indiana Dunes landscape look realistic in my paintings, similar to every other dunescape I’d ever seen.  Yawn.  So I started by messing around with some simple dunes scene photos I had taken.  I tweaked them big time with some Adobe Photoshop filters until the scenes were pared completely down to a few basic shapes and colors.  Then I did two pastel paintings using those tweaked photos as references.  I kept them small for my first go, so I wouldn’t be overwhelmed – 8x8”.  I framed them in matching off-white frames and I put them up for sale in a few art fairs and shows.

Dunescape I & II

What were people’s reactions?  First off, the locals who know my signature, tightly rendered style couldn’t believe that these two were mine!  They were so very different from what folks were used to seeing.  But overall the general impression they made was good, and then I sold one of them to a fellow local artist.  That was the real confirmation that I was onto something.  The artist who bought it told me she thought I should try rendering yet another dunescape with the same bold, minimal style, only go even bigger.

So I did, just this past week – Summit of 9, 14x11".  This one might sell fast also.  I’ve already had an inquiry and it’s not even framed yet!  Will I continue to do all my landscape paintings in this style?  Probably not.  But that doesn’t mean this was wasted effort.  I learned a thing or two along the way with these three gems:

 1.       Of all the biggies when it comes to rendering a painting – shape, line, value, and color – the least critical element that I can change and tweak however I want using this style, is color.  So, the possibilities are endless.  In fact, I could continue to paint just one of these three scenes over and over again and only change the color scheme, and each resulting painting would have the potential for being just as good as the first one in the series.

 2.       Picky details are optional.  The large shapes really tell the bulk of the story, so don’t get lost in the minutia.  Vary the sizes of shapes, having some small, some medium sized, and a few really large shapes.  The large ones will give the viewer empty blank spaces to rest their eyes and breathe while viewing.  They are important.  The goal with this style is to tell the whole story with as few shapes as possible.  Not as easy as it looks.

 3.       Light and shadow become major players when you strip a scene down to its bare bones.  Push them to their extremes.

 4.       Give more attention to edges.  Define them more clearly….everywhere. 

 5.       Choose a color scheme and stick to it.  That will help to prevent the whole thing from looking like a rainbow.  And distribute the main colors throughout the whole piece to give it balance.

 6.       Don’t muddy the scene with too much blending.  One shape, one color.

 7.       If it doesn’t look finished, that’s good.  Stop, don’t fuss.  If I’ve done #1-6, then I’m done.  Put my pastels down and step back to survey the piece as a whole.  The overall impact is more important than one picky detail.

What I realized when I listed these new insights here is that most of them can be applied to ANY painting, not just a minimalist styled one.  And so my knowledge base just grew and I’m not feeling so bored anymore.  My cage has been successfully rattled, and a re-energized artist is ready to forge on to her next painting.  Mission accomplished.