The June activity night with Richard Impey sounds like it was very informative and fun; the below write up was taken from the July Pelicans Palette.
The wonderful write up of this workshop has kindly been provided by Kristina Love, attached gallery photos provided by Gaye Pereira-Jackson and Kristina Love: Ten avid artists gathered enthusiastically (if somewhat nervously) at the Woods Street Art Space in Laverton over two full weekend days to learn more about painting portraits. On Saturday, Ben guided us through the big darks and big lights, encouraging us to be brave as we tackled the chiaroscuro method of portrait painting. We learnt about the proportions of the human face, and even “tested” on our knowledge before being let loose with paintbrushes. How many eye widths are there across the head? How do you estimate the distance from the chin to the bottom of the nose? Thus did we learn about the first holy grail of painting, FORM. Ben had then used Charlie, the plaster - cast head, to demonstrate the various planes of the face, teaching us about the second holy grail of painting, TONE. We heard the story about how Ben had rescued Charlie and other castes from the wreckage caused by University Art students in the1960’s overturning ‘establishment’ traditions of drawing, a sad throwing out of the baby with the bathwater, we all thought. Once we’d been introduced to the basics of the third holy grail, COLOUR (with its three dimensions of Tone, Chroma and Hue) we were ready to put brush to canvas and render our own version of John Singer Sargent’s self-portrait. After lunch, you could have heard a pin drop as we applied our paint (oil or acrylic) to our canvases. The only sounds were (in descending order of frequency): groans of frustration from us; commands from Ben of “Darker!”, ‘More paint!” or “Use Bigger Brushes!”; encouragement from Ben as he showed us how to “rescue paintings from the ditch”; little whines from Toby (Ben’s dog) as he begged to be let outside; and even the odd sigh of satisfaction as we mastered one little chiaroscuro technique. The next morning, troops replenished, we gathered again to tackle portraits in watercolour. Ben demonstrated various watercolour techniques and offered valuable advice on types of paper, paint and brushes appropriate for various tasks. We extended our knowledge of colour and tone and practiced “turning the form” of a series of spheres in watercolour. We worked out where to place the darkest tone, the mid-tone, the ‘bedbug’ line separating them (look up the fascinating origins of the term ‘bedbug line’!), the cast shadow, the reflected light and the highlight. At this point we learnt a little more about EDGE, the fourth of the holy grails of painting, as we decided how hard or soft to make the edges between each tone. As with the Saturday, in the afternoon we worked on our portraits of either Rembrandt or Elizabeth Winthrop Chanler (one of Sargent’s models). Pretty much the same groans, commands and encouragement ensued as on the previous day, though perhaps there were fewer sighs of satisfaction as we tackled this tricky medium. By Sunday evening, we were exhausted, exhilarated and challenged in turn, but well-equipped to head off in new painterly directions, armed with deeper knowledge of important fundamentals of painting, and canvases to continue to work on. Thanks Ben for your patience and support – you must have been utterly exhausted! |
HBAS NewsLearn about what's going on at Hobsons Bay Arts Society and in our community! Archives
June 2023
|