Here's a little quiz.
What does the sample below represent? I took the color out to make the quiz more difficult.
Here's the same sample, but with color. Got it figured out yet?
You probably do, but this is more for me, because I'm the one with the problem.
Here is the sample placed with the context of the painting.
The answer is background tree foliage.
The point to this quiz, is to demonstrate that even though I know trees are made of numerous branches with countless individual leaves, it requires very little information (detail) for the brain to figure out what any portion of an image is, when placed within the context of recognizable objects. A few random branches, and subtle value and color shifts, and that's all that is needed.
This is what I've been struggling with for the past few weeks. When there is a portion of my painting that is not quite right and I go to fix it, analytically my brain says draw what you know -- add lots of detail. And subconsciously I do, which only perpetuates the problem. In reality, the problem relates to incorrect value or color temperature.
So, this is what I'll call done. I had to finish, get it in a frame and downtown by 4:30.
The sample looks like a small abstract painting of greens. In essence, it's a smaller part of a larger abstract shape produced by the distal trees.
ReplyDeleteI think one of the toughest things in the painting is the choice to leave things out of a painting (excess detail, unnecessary elements). It's a constant fight with our left brain to add the detail, thinking that will improve it. In my experience, it pretty much never does. You got it just right in this painting.
BTW, I love the figures here. When I cover them up with my finger, the painting just doesn't have as much impact. Figures can easily dominate a painting, but you've surrounded them with enough other interesting information so that doesn't happen. Well done, sir!
Sonya, I'm glad you like the figures. Although very small, I kept them in to help keep you from focusing solely on the azaleas. I hope they take your eye back in past the azaleas and then follow the gate (the dominant darks) to the left, and the shadows back to the right. At least that was the plan.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the lesson...too easy to get carried away with detail. And yes, the touch of figures is perfect: I want to go with them, they take me further into the piece.
ReplyDeleteThanks Cindy. I'm a slow learner, so I have to keep repeating the same message over and over, one day it will sink in for good.
ReplyDelete