A New Art Degree

Posted by Carl Purcell – October 28, 2011

There are many young artists graduating from university art programs today who can, as Gilbert and Sullivan said, “discourse in novel phrases of your complicated state of mind”, but cannot draw. One university I know has even removed basic drawing from its campus curriculum and offer it only as an on-line course.

These programs place so much emphasis on pushing the envelope that students never discover the wealth within that envelope. As Canadian artist Robert Genn said in his twice-weekly letter (rgenn@saraphina.com), “Our world is coming down off a prayer-rug that faced New York, London and Berlin. For decades, a lot of poor quality art has emanated from these centres, and the world of art schools and University art faculties have encouraged the worship. This mass delusion has undernourished countless echelons of idealistic artkids.”

However, many of these students feel that they wasted their time; that they should have  spent that time practicing and learning to draw. They were taught that the purpose of art is to challenge people’s thinking about what is art, and that the expression of beauty is an out-dated idea. Yet here they stand with degree in hand, and an unsung melody inside wanting to be set free. I have had many people tell me that they learned more in the three days of my workshop than they did in four years at the university. That is a sad indictment of the system.

In my own case I found the academic experience enriching but lacking in fundamental skill training. Beginning drawing classes were taught by graduate students so that the professors could focus on the upper class “serious” students. The drop-out rate was high. Most of what I learned about drawing I learned by studying other artists drawings and by direct observation of the world around me. Mine has been a long road of gradual learning illuminated by small lights that came on less often than I wished. Maybe we need a new art degree, the MOS (Master of Observational Skills).

Have you gone through an entire academic art program and exited feeling artistically undernourished? What kind of experience have you had and how did you gain the knowledge that underpins your current artwork? I’d like to hear your story.


Useful tools

Posted by Carl Purcell – September 8, 2011

One of the most often asked questions by workshop attendees is “What brush are you using?”

While art is created in the head, it is helpful to have tools that will match the vision. So here is a list of some of the tools I have found very useful.

BRUSHES: I am not going to list all my brushes, of which I have about twenty. Most of those are in my brush caddy so that I will look like a real artist. I have tried many brushes searching for the qualities I require. Here are the ones I use all the time.

Langnickel no. 3085 “Combo” – 1-inch, 1 1/2-inch and 2 -inch.  These are a combination of real hair and synthetic. The hairs are longer than those found in most wash brushes of similar width. Plus there are a lot more hairs because the ferrule is about twice as thick as many wash brushes.Because of this it hold a lot of water. It has the snap of sable and returns to a thin straight edge every time. I love this one. I use it for about 75% of the painting. They are not found in most art catalogues. Go to: www.hofcraaft.com. Then from their menu on the left select “fine art painting supplies” On that page scroll down to “Miscellaneous fine art supplies” and in that list click on “brushes”. Scroll down just a bit and you will see “Royal Langnickel” and their logo. Click on that and then scroll down just a bit until you see a paddle handle wash brush with the name “Langnickel Signwriter”  above it “. Click that and you have found the brush. This is the best flat brush I have ever used.

My other brushes and paints I get from Daniel Smith. (call 1-800-224-4065 and ask for a catalogue.)

Daniel Smith series 23. 3/4 inch flat,  no. 6 round, no. 8 round, and no. 12 round.  These come to the finest point I have found on any brush-even a sable. However because of the cost I don’t have heartburn when the point wears out and I have to retire it. Another good round brush of which I have a few is the Loew-Cornell series 7020 brush. I do not use a rigger because I want to be able to vary the width of the stroke.

For paints I use Daniel Smith almost exclusively. The pigments are very finely ground, the tinting strength exceptional/ There are other top brands of watercolor paint, but I have tried them all and found none to surpass Daniel Smith. Here are the ones I use:

Quinacridone Gold, Quinacridone Sienna, Quinacridone Burnt Orange, Quinacridone Red, Quinacridone Pink, Quinacridone Rose, New Gamboge, Transparent Pyrol Orange (I have fallen in love with this one), Pyrol Orange (more opaque), Permanent Alizarin Crimson, Carbazole Violet, Phthalo Blue, Manganese Blue Hue, Ultramarine Blue, and Sap Green. My one color  that I get from another source is horizon Blue by Holbein. It’s opaque and beautiful.

Other than that I use a 2-inch square of foam sponge – the kind you use to make accent pillows. I get a square foot of it at a craft store and cut it up. It’s great for lifting a small shape or line of white.

And for paaper I use almost exclusively 140 lb rough Arches. I sometimes use 300 lb rough. I also go through a lot of Viva paper towels.

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Plein Air painting

Posted by Carl Purcell – July 5, 2011

I was recently asked to jury a plein air event. One artist accosted me afterward to complain that his kind of painting was rarely picked for awards in the plein air events.I actually had considered his, considered its merits etc. but decided against it because of the high quality of some of the other paintings. He made this point: Plein air simply means that the work was painted outside.

I think that it means a little more. I think it means it was painted outside because out there you can study first hand the subtle color plays and value changes provided by nature that are often missed in a photo. It means to be part of the environment, the sun, the breeze, the sounds and smells, and to respond to it all while being in it. One could just go out on the deck and paint the studio painting one was going to paint in the studio, and to me that is not plein air painting.  I could be wrong. What do you think?


Working from photographs

Posted by Carl Purcell – April 21, 2011

There are artists who deplore the very thought of working from photographic references, believing that to do so is to turn over the creative process to a mechanical device. On the other end are artists who not only use photographic references, but project the image onto the surface and paint it exactly as projected. To me both of these approaches seem a bit extreme. The former smacks of elitism, a form of artistic self-righteousness, and the latter an avoidance of the rigors of drawing, (and the freedom that results from the practice)

I personally believe that the camera is a great tool for the artist. There are things it can capture, like the flight of a bird, or children at play that simply cannot be set up for study in the studio. However, I do believe that painting and drawing en plein air, out there with the sunlight and the insects and the wind and the smells gives one the knowledge that can make a studio painting authentic. The camera has its limitations. It cannot see the subtle nuances of color and value that the human eye can see.  It cannot feel anything about the scene before it. It cannot connect that scene to previous images and experiences. We experience, the camera records, and that is the biggest difference.

When I draw and paint outdoors I bring everything I have ever done to the process. My camera severs this single view from everything else. My brain doesn’t.

I see the subject differently than my camera does. I edit out everything that does not enhance the idea I have about the subject, and in my mind (such that it is) I exaggerate the characteristics that made me stop and look in the first place. That is why so often my photographs are disappointing. They didn’t grasp what I was feeling.  My drawings however, do. My paintings, even though not as perfect as my studio paintings have spirit and are records not only of what I saw, but of how I felt, and of what I considered important.

To illustrate this I am including a drawing I did on site in Polperro, Cornwall, England. I am also including a photograph taken

Drawing done with 6B pencil in my sketch book.

from about the same position, and the painting that was done from my drawing. I used the photo for support since it recorded some little details that I didn’t include in my drawing. The drawing re-connected me with the scene, the smell of the sea, the sound of the seagulls, the retreating trickles of water as the tide went out, and the overall texture of the place. My photo didn’t, but it supplied some precious little tidbits.

Hanging dry dock - Polperro


Letting our paintings go

Posted by Carl Purcell – March 3, 2011

I have heard from some artists that after working so long on a painting it is hard to let it go, to sell it or even give it away. One said that her painting were like her children, she didn’t want to part with them, and wondered how I could part with some of the paintings I had done.

I have never felt such a connection, so perhaps I am insensitive. Each painting I do is like a stepping stone leading somewhere I want to go but can’t yet see. Each one takes me closer to something just over the hill. But the journey is so absorbing that I seldom look back at the path of paintings taking me along.

What are your thoughts on this?  Do any of you have difficulty parting with your art?


Seeing is Believing

Posted by Carl Purcell – February 13, 2011

As in many of my paintings you will notice little spots of color. While this may seem like an artistic gimmick, it is actually based on observation. I noticed that as I walk along, little facets of rock, or glass, or leaves wor things I don’t even recognize catch and reflect the light in sudden little flashes. I began noticing this and wondered how I could include this phenomenon in my paintings.

So, instead of painting shapes a solid color or even mingling different colors I could leave little bits of light throughout the shape. Then I began adding color to some of these. I like the life it brings to the whole. They don’t seem unnatural, just lively. We experience this in our everyday lives, we just don’t take notice of it. Let’s open our eyes more. I wonder what else I have been missing.


Painting a strong color foundation

Posted by Carl Purcell – November 29, 2010

Every watercolor needs a good foundation.

Begin with a foundation of color.

Every good house is built on a good foundation. It is not a good idea to trim the budget much in that area. Likewise in a painting.

In this little watercolor the foundation is in the color washes especially visible on the two walls. Before painting anything in the window, I laid down a foundation wash that began with warm colors on the left and ended with cool colors on the right. I painted right over the window frames, knowing that when I left the light spacers between the panes the initial wash would be light enough.

A good foundation will make a lot of later details unnecessary. For example; on the large wall I only have to suggest the siding with a few lines, kind viewers will supply the rest.


Painting and walking on the edge.

Posted by Carl Purcell – November 20, 2010

I don’t remember hearing any discussion of the quality of edges in any painting class I ever took on my way to a degree in art. Perhaps I was just too ignorant to recognize the importance of it and simple didn’t listen.

When we translate that 3-dimensional world into flat shapes on a canvas or paper, there is no “in front or behind, there is only adjacent. One shape shares an edge with another shape on the surface. If we are only involved with the items we are painting we won’t see these edges. In face, we will want to clarify all of the edges. If we really look at the edges we will discover that most of them are not too clear. Only a few are sharp and focussed. Some are lost entirely.

oil painting on canvas.

In this painting of a lady walking down a street with her shopping bag, I was very taken by the edges. Almost all of them were soft focus. The door jam wasn’t sharp at all. If I had clarified it, it would have cut the painting apart. I particularly liked the lost edge on the front of the bag.

The curb could likewise have been alien if I had sharpened the edge. I deliberately made it even less defined.

Control of the edges is much easier in oil paint. Watercolors  give us a generous 30 seconds or so to adjust the edges. Wetness of the paper, amount of paint in the brush, and the amount of water in the brush all have to be calculated to achieve the degree of softness desired.


Directed Doodle Drawing

Posted by Carl Purcell – November 9, 2010

We all love to doodle. Why not harness the energy of the scribble-line doodle to produce drawings with control and spontaneity?

I doodle with random scribbles while talking on the phone, and the fun of this kind of random subconscious doodle is that i can watch it develop as I do it. In a way I am the actor and the audience at the same time. Pick up a ball point pen and try this:

scribble pen line drawing of fellow flickr artist, Taswir.

First, just scribble and become enchanted by the wonderful tangle of lines that ensue.

Next, pick a simple object, and while you scribble, focus on one area of the object and direct the tangle of lines to describe that area. Don’t outline it, just keep scribbling until you have drawn it, then move on to an adjacent area. This requires that the motion of drawing or scribbling continues while you keenly observe the location and size of the next area relative to the first area.

Watch the drawing develop instead of outlining and filling in. This kind of drawing produces an organic kind of image, one that grows into the subject. The drawing will also exhibit much more energy than most drawings because the line is so agitated.


Charcoal drawing & the value of values

Posted by Carl Purcell – October 29, 2010

Charcoal portrait of Frank Bingley

I was fortunate starting out in that I was afraid of color. My palette was limited by fear and of course the usual financial constraints of being a student. Because of that fear I became a valuist (you won’t find this word in your art appreciation books) instead of a colorist. I studied paintings to see how the artists used lights and darks (values) to both model form and to direct the viewer’s eyes around the format.

This drawing illustrates both, but first I’ll discuss the process for those who have not used charcoal in this manner. It’s fun and easy.

1. I lightly coated the entire sheet with strokes using the long edge of a stick of compressed charcoal.

2. Using a chamois I lightly rubbed the charcoal until I had smeared all the strokes into an even gray.

3. With a 4B charcoal pencil I blocked in the forms.

4. Then with the charcoal stick I put in the big black shape on the left, leaving the thin line for the rim of the glasses.

5. Then with the 4B charcoal pencil again I drew in the eye and mouth areas. And using a blending stump I dipped into the dark shape and drew with the stump the darker grays under he eye and along the nose. with the same charcoal-charged stump I laid in the values in the beard.

6. the crisp lines of light in the beard were done using a plastic eraser which I had cut with a knife to give me a very sharp edge. A kneaded eraser was used to lift out other highlights.

The real trick, if there is one, is to see the value relationships. Our sensible logical brain limits all values to dark and light. As artists we have to ask “How dark?” and “Compared with what?” “What is the lightest light and what is the darkest dark?” That was why I began with the darkest shape. Then I knew how dark everything else would be. The paper was already middle light gray, so everything else was either lighter or darker than that gray. Squinting is the only way to see that relationship. It causes crow’s feet wrinkles at the corners of your eyes, but so does smiling. Both are good-real good.


copyright © 2010 Carl Purcell Art. All rights reserved.