A recent issue of Wildlife Art magazine interviewed an artist whose vision I’ve admired, whose work I find intriguing and original. She paints in quite muted tones, and the article said, in part:
She frowns on fantasy displays of color, believing them false. “I don’t have color getting in the way of the composition. Here are the colors in nature; how can I improve on that?”
I was surprised and puzzled at her comment. I do not know which artists she was thinking of … but surely one of the joys of the art world is that we all see in different ways. She has painted ravens, in quiet black and ochre tones - yet, when I depict a raven I see beautiful blues and purples in its plumage, and to paint it otherwise would be untrue to my vision. Cadmiums and carbazoles and ceruleans are essential to the passion of my process. And color IS part and parcel of my composition, most especially when it comes to those damnably frustrating and - if they work - satisfying abstract backgrounds.
The diversity of human - and art - experience is something not to judge, but to celebrate.
Painting: “Raven Study #2″, 6×8 oil on handmade muslin panel.
Visions West Gallery (Bozeman/Livingston, MT) 406.222.0337
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March 3rd, 2008 at 5:09 pm
I love your colorful paintings, it is one of the many reasons I am drawn to them. Color just doesn’t represent “real life” it also conveys energy and mood among other things. How boring the world would be if artists used only the colors represented in “nature”.
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:38 pm
In regards to the artist that paints in muted colors and frowns on a display of colors……..this is what I say:
She is a tonalist
You are a colorist
Rembrant and so many Old Masters already did the burnt umber “brown sauce” thing so I don’t find her muted color pallet very original. Besides, color when done nicely grabs people and makes them really enjoy a painting. Color also can be an integral part of composition as it gives great harmony to a work of art. I too see many “colors” even when looking at animals with “earth toned” local colors. Its obvious that the color of natural light and everything that bounces off of it gives beautiful color effects into this local color. And I truly love how you use color as an abstract background to support the animal. This can actually bring beauty into a painting with an animal sporting “natures colors”.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:04 pm
I agree with Joe’s observation - she’s a tonalist. I would never diss a tonalist for seeing and painting the way he or she does - it’s obviously their experience of the world, and can be a sensitive way to portray mood. But as Toni says, color for me is ENERGY!
I’m working on a burrowing owl painting right now - he’s a brown and cream little creature, yet I find tints of purple and blue in various places on him as I’m working…plus the brown has all kinds of reds and golds in it. If I can think to I’ll post some ‘in-progress’ stuff on this blog from time to time, to show a painting’s progress.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:29 pm
She frowns on fantasy displays of color, believing them false. “I don’t have color getting in the way of the composition. Here are the colors in nature; how can I improve on that?”
I find this statement both factually incorrect and arrogant.
Incorrect because the colors we see are very dependent upon both lighting and individual perception, which essentially means that there is no such thing as an “absolute” or “correct” color.
And arrogant because it assumes that one person’s perception is somehow superior to that of others.
Perhaps she needs to read “The Nature of Light and Colour in the Open Air”, by M. Minnaert.
If one is basing one’s assessment of the correct way to treat color on the work of the old masters, one has to be especially careful because in many cases, what we see today is not even close to what it was when the artist first painted it. Colors have changed dramatically in many cases. The Sistine Chapel is a perfect example. Until the restoration of the murals a few years back, most people (even art experts) thought Michelangelo painted in muted tones. How wrong they were!
March 4th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Julie;
I thank GOD that I can “SEE” color ,as well appreciate the variations,tone,tints,hue’s.chroma. Isn’t it great that we do not all see color or any thing else alike. I can’t believe how “BORING” it would be if every one did or saw every thing alike. How fantastic is it that AS ARTISTS WE CAN CELEBRATE THE CHOICES WE NOW HAVE. Julie, I love your artwork, your out look, and I so enjoy your monthly news letter.
March 4th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Hi Julie -
I just LOVE your raven paintings! So much life and movement to them, and ravens are quirky birds who deserve to have their say. I have done a couple of paintings of crows - not nearly as vivid as yours, but I like them. I lived with a man who called himself “the Old Crow” for several years (and sigh, he suddenly died), so I had reason to depict crows. Anyhow, I think the comments are all on target - color is as personal as the way we see the world and how we draw it. Muted colors are OK, but life just breaks out when the tones are vivid. Stick with it, you rock!
March 4th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
As Larry notes - it’s such an individual thing! I might see something as lavendar that you see as pink, or someone else sees as blue…or my long-suffering color-blind husband sees as “a pretty shade, but I don’t know what it is” (god’s truth, this is what he says).
Barbara and Susan - thank you both for the lovely and enthusiastic comments! Color, art, and painting ARE personal - why else would there be so many artists AND so many collectors to appreciate all those viewpoints? Why else would the National Museum of Wildlife Art have a big John Nieto coyote across from Tucker Smith’s elk refuge painting at the entrance to their main galleries - talk about two wildly different styles and points of view!
March 12th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Just a comment re this woman’s observations of not letting fantasy get in the way of color. I look at her comments as her true feelings — just her perceptions or observations of what she sees. As your readers correctly note, those are what she perceives, while someone else may see the actual colors a little differently. At any given time, the same person may also see those colors a little differently. I didn’t get the impression that she was being elitist, just honest.
March 13th, 2008 at 8:26 am
I agree that her comments reflect her true feelings; my quibble is with her belief that she is painting only “the colors in nature” - as if someone who paints the same animal differently than she does is, somehow, wrong.
Is John Nieto wrong to paint his modernist coyote in yellow, orange, and fuchsia? Was Carl Rungius wrong to paint his elk with golds, greens, blues - whatever was in his landscape? She renders her animals only in black and ochre, which is not how I see them. If she sees them in this tonalist fashion, then I cannot argue with her vision - but she fails to acknowledge the vision of others with her dismissal.
P.S. Are we related?
March 14th, 2008 at 6:43 am
I wonder what “tonalists” think o f Van Gogh!
probably think he was nuts.
oh, yeh…he was.
as were many artists who are considered great.
People like their work precisely because it is so different from what they normally see.
These artists are famous/popular largely because they saw the world differently — ie, because they did not see a crow as black as many people have been taught to see it.
I say “taught” because it ain’t black. The only thing truly black thing in the universe is a “black hole” which sucks up all the light and reflects nothing.
We are taught in school, by our parents and others that “crows are black, grass is green, sky is blue” etc but when we really look at these things in the ambient light, we find that this is really only an approximation, an average.