Gesture and Figuratives

Try to begin your figure studies with gesture and abstraction:



Pay attention to 4-value macchia principle:



In your landscapes, the same ideas hold true:



Maintain fluidity and expressiveness:



Next report: from Milano

University of Oregon Demo This Saturday

The talk at the U of O Bookstore will be a two-hour demo and discussion of theory. As the painting above hopefully shows, painting with creative brushwork and gesture is more than just technique but is often the means necessary to unite the particular and the general and to explore, experimentally, the art of seeing nature.

painting table:

pittore: Getting Ready for Studio Tour Sale

pittore: Getting Ready for Studio Tour Sale

Getting Ready for Studio Tour Sale

Regarding going from the onsite sketch to the in-studio painting:


"Waving Hands Like Clouds", oil/canvas 2010

Description: This one is a bit complicated. I intended the painting to maintain the essence of the sketch, that is opposing hills and a distant valley, shown in linear perspective but the sky took on a strong dramatic energy with clouds and atmosphere. This is also conveyed through color (violet). I titled the painting "Wave hands like clouds" after the tai chi movement with that exact name.

Here (below) I am returning, for a moment anyway, to the "macchia" concept (or pattern) which is applied in sienna:



This is very characteristic of my work which often just plays with this macchia idea and then, perhaps, a slight note of color. But color can also become the principal consideration as in this landscape of Italy:



But the macchia concept can also be approached in color itself with a proper underpainting in sienna -- sometimes a bit darker to bring out the macchia painted on top in pure color. My goal, in this instance, was pure sponteneity to convey the fresh spirit of the sunlight and the scene:



Sometimes the color of green has to be carefully calculated to convey the warmth of summer and the feeling of being outside, among the :