Daisy Love

 

14 x 11

oil and cold wax on Ray Mar panel

Whenever I am at a museum or art gallery, I enjoy looking at floral paintings. I look for composition, texture, and a sense of beauty and poetry in the fragile tissue of the petals. Fechin, Van Gogh, Renoir, they all do a great job with flowers, but it is Manet who steals the show every time.

Inspiration at the Museums

Soutine at Portland Art Museum

Renoir at PAM

Seattle Art Museum
no photos allowed at the Picasso exhibit

Frye Art Museum seating for 3


It's been a great week for studying artwork and looking at oil paintings. First, the Portland Art Museum on Tuesday with Celeste. I was on a mission to look at the "Little Pastry Chef" by Soutine, a French expressionist painter from Belarus. Lively brushwork, thick paint, and that beautiful red background and chair! Wow.

Not possible to ignore the Renoir on the wall. Nope. Can't ignore that one.

Thursday a run up to Seattle to catch the Picasso exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum. Do not miss this show! You have until January 11, 2011 to see it. I got to see it with Celeste and Carolyn. What fun.

Another stop at the Frye Art Museum where we saw a portion of their collection displayed in a great room with floor to ceiling artwork. Nice that we could share the 3-person chair!

Now, time to get back to oil painting. I am inspired and juiced up with all of the soul-touching masterpieces I have seen this week. Oh, yes, life is good!

Blame it on Renoir

"Jeunes filles au piano"
Pierre Auguste Renoir, 1892

I've always liked this painting. I like the feel of the girls sitting together at the piano, figuring out a new piece of music. I spent many years at the piano, sometimes with my sisters, so I relate to the subject in a personal way. No surprise there.

When I went to a Corban College production of "Little Women" last week, I enjoyed watching my friend's daughter play the role of Amy. And I took a lot of photos. One of the photos really touched me as it featured two young women at a piano. It didn't take long to come up with the idea to paint from that reference photo.

How many things can go wrong with a painting? Well, I'm sure I hit almost all of them.

1. I picked a smallish piece of paper for my support, which made the figures smaller than comfortable for a pastel piece.
2. I made several drawing errors that erased the intimacy between the characters.
3. I did not pay attention to value cues that could have tied the figures together
4. I was faced with painting 2" faces with blunt 1" pastels.

I could go on, but you get the drift. Not a positive outcome.

But I learn a lot even from paintings that don't turn out well. Maybe I even learn more from those kinds of paintings. I plan to take my idea back to the studio today for another go at the subject.