Intention
I have never dreaded the vertigo of "retirement". In May 2020, I put an end to a rich professional life. I had already envisaged this moment with serenity and enthusiasm. With my head always full of projects, I was confident that boredom would not catch up with me. Would I miss of my former colleagues and clients? Certainly. But not knowing what to do with my time, not for a moment!
Traveling, painting, writing, reading, cooking, playing, wandering, these and many other action verbs animate my life.
Traveling, in foreign countries or close to home, are opportunities to open myself to discovery. Even in places that I frequent often, there is always something new that presents itself, in front of me and within me. Seeing, hearing, smelling, experiencing the country allows me to access the beauty of the world in many ways.
It feeds my soul, my creativity, the artist in me.
I am an artist. It took me many years to dare identifying myself as such. It felt presumptuous. I have made peace with this feeling by rejecting the elitist nature or the obligation of fame that one may associate with it. What is art if not to access one's sensibility. By painting, or by any other means of expressing my creativity, I try to reproduce a particular state of sensitivity.
Without wanting to take myself too seriously, this comes with a certain responsibility. Having the intention to evoke a feeling does not necessarily guarantee success. As with many things, the intention must be nurtured with attention for it to be realized.
For example, I am always mindful in my wandering activities in nature: I am here and in the present moment. I also pay attention to the memories I keep and to the photos I use as references. All this forms my foundation. Then, I must be attentive to the representation I want to make of it and to the means to realize it.
This is where technique comes into play. As in sports, mastering technique is essential to achieve a quality performance. It must be well integrated and mastered so that the execution comes naturally, as if it were performed without effort. Having a good coach and a good training program helps to refine technique and develop muscle and neurological memory. This is no different in art.
Attention
I have gleaned all sorts of techniques from reading specialized books and watching artist demonstrations on the web. Not all are of equal value. Still, it has contributed to my learning curve. The turning point for me was the discovery of a Canadian painter, based in Los Angeles, Ian Roberts. In 2021, I was looking forward to the videos he posted on YouTube every Tuesday. By a wonderful coincidence, I discovered them just at the right time for me. He was an excellent teacher. His explanations and demonstrations were brief, clear and simple. I adopted him as my virtual coach.
Coincidences happen many times in a lifetime.
The important thing is to notice them
and seize the opportunities they present.
In the fall of that year, Ian Roberts announced the launch of a Mastering Composition workshops to be offered by videoconference, in the winter of 2022. I didn't hesitate long. I was excited by the opportunity to get more formal training. Also, the virtual format was perfectly suited to the circumstances of the global pandemic.
I learned how to use drawing to plan the composition of my paintings. The approach he teaches has nothing to do with academic drawing techniques. The goal is to test and adjust the composition to identify and correct problems before painting. For several weeks, I practiced using simple and careful strokes to establish the place of each element in space, to properly define areas of light and shadow and to plan the movement of the eye within the frame. I was amazed to see my evolution in only eight weeks. See the difference between the two drawings below, made before and after the workshops.
Afterwards, I followed two other workshops on brushwork techniques and on color.
Realization
During a break after my drawing lessons, I began to consider new ways of working to get rid of my tendency to fall into minutiae. I told myself, the human brain can interpret an image even when some elements are only suggested... the impressionist painters demonstrated this well.
One morning, I opened my tablet to my reference picture and taped a study I made in my drawing class to the wall. I put a blank canvas on my easel and pulled out a single brush, a number 4 filbert. I forbade myself from touching my small detail brushes (numbers 1 to 000!) and gave myself 4 hours to complete my project (one tenth of the time it took me to complete "The Monroe Lake Bridge", as an example).
I used this challenge to paint a scene captured the previous summer in the Bic National Park, on a trail leading to the Baie des Cochons. At the end of the 4 hours, the canvas was covered and the painting almost finished. I stopped to give myself time to think about what I needed to do to finish it, respecting my own instructions to avoid superfluous details. The next day, in 90 minutes, I had completed the exercise.
It was an eye-opening experience.
I don't pretend to have rid myself of my mania for detail. I am still tempted to do so, but I think I do it more sparingly.
To continue my progress in this vein (intention), when approaching my projects, I focus (attention) on the shapes, not on concrete elements like a tree, a bush, or a stone. To make it easier, I step back from my reference photo. With my eyes squinted, or without my glasses (I'm nearsighted), large masses and areas of light and shadow simply reveal themselves.
This is an excellent way to silence the rational left brain
and let the conceptual right brain express itself.
This way of working is particularly important to me when I apply the first layer of paint (realization). Once I have identified the large masses (tree line, stream curve, path, etc.) I can begin to define the light and shadow areas, as well as the colors and warm and cool tonal shades. In these two steps, most of the work is done. Then I can suggest just enough detail to properly inform the viewer's eye and invite them into the illusion.
For example, in completing the painting La route du Parc (2023), it is easy to see that more detail is not needed in the foliage to distinguish the trees from each other, nor on the gravel road, where I probably would have tried to define the gravel more, not so long ago.
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