For my spring semester watercolor class, I decided to do a mastercopy demonstration of Johannes Vermeer's (1632 - 1675), Het Straatje (The Little Street). The original is an oil painting and hangs at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
I started off by drawing accurate proportions for the buildings. In hindsight, I should have spent more time on the drawing stage because my proportions are off and my building is tilted. Buildings and structures require more precision when drawing. After my pencil work, I began painting the sky and then moved on to paint the buildings section by section. I always try to work each layer from general to specific; many of the details were done in the final session. I also used gouache to achieve certain effects such as the mortar between the bricks. I learned several things over the course of this project. I'm usually a very fast painter which serves me well when working en plein air; but this painting required patience and a discerning eye. I've worked on it since March and yet I still see so many things to add and improve. The brickwork alone is an endless pursuit. I'll keep working on it here and there and I'm planning to frame it some day. This mastercopy is allowing me to really appreciate the fact that Vermeer was a brilliant painter with a mind-boggling level of skill.
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I can feel a little hint of spring in the air lately and it's got me excited to start teaching again. I always enjoy my semesters at the Ridgewood Community School and I'm always happy to see new and familiar faces.
This time around: I'll be teaching Drawing for Beginners, Watercolor for Beginners, and Watercolor Level 2. Also, last semester I presented a lecture about my summer in Giverny; this was a very popular program so we're bringing it back around for this spring semester. I wasn't able to teach the drawing course last semester and it's filling up quickly so if you're interested in it then I suggest registering asap. Classes begin on Monday, March 4th and there's still time to register, which you can do online: https://rcs.ridgewood.k12.nj.us/brochure__registration or by calling 201-670-2777 Looking forward to another great semester! I just found this website that has some photos of paintings and drawings by my great, great Aunt, Tineke (Ties) Schaap-Stuurman (1918 - 2001). She was Dutch and had an artistic family. I only met her when I was a toddler so I don't remember her, but apparently she thought I was quite a joker even as a 3 year old.
The funny thing is that there's a strong similarity between her style and mine. We have some of her original art, but I never tried to emulate her style or anything. There must be some genetic component to the way we make brushstrokes and use paint. Or maybe it's how we see the world which determines how we paint it. I'm not sure, but it's very interesting to see and contemplate. I wish I could have spoken with her about painting to see if we shared similar thoughts. It looks like she worked en plein air also. The photos of her on the site were taken by a Dutch photographer, which is also cool. You can click on the image below to go directly to the site for more information. It's all in Dutch, but there's information about each of the artworks. I've been working on a series of self portraits lately and most of them haven't turned out well. Since I've been struggling with them I decided to try a watercolor. I've always felt more comfortable with a brush and I feel like the stars aligned tonight.
I'm happy with this self portrait because it looks like me, but it also feels like me. This is something that's hard to put into words, but I try to capture that feeling in every portrait that I paint. The physical likeness mostly comes from proportion, but I'm not quite sure where the deeper feeling comes from. I also had some good realizations with this self portrait and it developed smoothly. I started off with an accurate underdrawing in pencil and then focused on the overall forms before I developed the detail. Yesterday, I was sketching late at night and it hit me how important the underlying form and structure is. For instance, if I sketch a face the detail has to sit on top of the form. There are a lot of elements involved with any painting, but I think this idea of form before detail is very important. |
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