Landscape Research Point continued...

Some landscapes from early 20th Century which explore very different ways of painting landscape.

Paul Klee Landscape with sunset 1923

Flat, shapes and colours

Klee Station L112

What would happen if I tried simplifying all into shapes and colours like this?

Georgia O'Keefe Lake George - Autumn 1922
Vilcek collection

The trees are very strongly rounded - sensual.
Try overdoing it like this

Greyed colours show the low light

Oscar Bluemner No. 6 Valley 
Simplified shapes again, this time curved.

Oscar Bluemner No.3 Port beacon from Vilcek collection

Oscar Bluemner Port Amboy West (Tottenville)

Emphasis on the geometric, with the tones and colours secondary. Try it!

Stanley Spencer Landscape in North Wales

Detail definitely secondary to 3D shapes provided by tone contrasts.

Stanley Spencer Cookham Flowers in a Window

Detail is important but hasn't overcome the shapes of the roofs and hedges.

Landscape in contemporary textile art

Looking at how some textile artists work with landscape. With help from www.textileartist.com

Heather Collins

Forest floor
Heather Collins
handmade fabric, free machine embroidery

Detail of leaves from Forest Floor
Both images from heathercollins.co.uk

This sculpture gave me a wow moment when I saw it. I really enjoy the intricacy of the detail and the realism. From her website it is obvious that she is inspired by the textures and details, like me. I need to work on seeing the bigger picture as well.

Fiona Robertson is good at this. Her embroidered pictures of the Hampshire countryside show the whole view seen by a walker (rather than just a small part of the forest floor!) It's also interesting to see how her sketches translate into final pieces.
http://www.fionarobertsonartworks.co.uk/landscape-embroidery.html
Looking at these landscapes with 'range of tone' specs on, I can see that the ones with the widest range from dark to light are the most successful in showing depth (eg the red and orange leaves one she used for the header of the page, and the dark path through the yellow flowers are much more direct and atmospheric than 'first signs' or 'autumn view' - although they both use colour beautifully.

Looking at this I think I should have a try doing a single sketch in different degrees of tonal contrast, to see what happens to it.

Carol Naylor's landscapes are more expressive than realistic, and use colour in interesting ways.
She also deliberately uses the distorting effect of the machine embroidery on duck canvas.
http://www.carolnaylor.co.uk/gallery/gallery10.html

Carol Naylor Diamonds and Rust
from a Spanish landscape

Sea of Lavender
Carol Naylor
That image, of a field full of lavender flowers, is one which you never forget.
I notice that she has not put in the flower stalk detail in the foreground, and in fact that would distract from the movement towards the ridge of pale yellow in the middleground.

I could do that sketch in different combinations of colours too, to find out what that does to the image. 

Heather Dubreuil makes art quilts out of fabric she has dyed and then fused and stitched. They seem to be mainly of urban landscapes. They are of a size to be displayed on the wall like a painting. Here are a few examples:

Rooftop terrasse
abstract in some ways
makes you think

Santa Cruz de Tenerife
reminiscent of Klee
partly because of the flatness I think
and the limited range of colours

Villagio Toscano
The texture and colour intensity
contrast between the foreground and
background are very effective.

These are much more blocky than the other landscapes which reflects what urban landscapes are like. It is more difficult to see a metaphorical or other meaning in these.

Caroline Dunn
http://carolinedunn.weebly.com/landscapes.html
Through this link, 'A walk around the block' a piece created from a sketchbook walk much like the one we've been doing in the course. She has left the sky, except in the places where the birds are flying.

Winter Landscape in the Dales
Caroline Dunn
This has a very strong sky threatening the landscape with the darkest and lightest tones, and the freest marks.

I could try using different degrees of freedom /control in drawing style to contrast natural and man-made.

Laura Breitman
Another detail person, but this time with an eye on the whole image.
http://laurabreitman.net/collage/landscape/
These have a very accomplished feel to them. Attention to detail, composition, colour and tone. Very impressive and beautiful too. There is no need for meaning when it is so well done.

Laura Breitman Looking up
Collage in fabric

Detail of 'looking up' showing that
it is made of fabric collage

Laura Breitman Sunset

Laura Breitman Under the EI

Note to self - all those composition sketches and emphasis on range of tone etc are worth it!

Thinking about the ideas in Contemporary Drawing, what does the use of textiles as medium bring to these pieces? 

Heather Collins' forest floor - it focusses my mind on the impressive feat of producing something like that out of textiles. IE it stops being about the wonderful colours and textures of nature and becomes about the skill of the artist in duplicating it. More so than a painter? Perhaps. Because we are less used to seeing this kind of technical skill in this medium, maybe?

Laura Breitman's pieces, though, I had that awed feeling, but it was much less important than the experience of looking at something beautiful and evocative. I suppose that the use of the printed fabrics (some printed herself for the purpose) in collage add to the depth and resonance of the image.

Fiona Robertsons farm landscapes - I think that using textiles makes one aware of the stillness of them - the contemplative pace of both the sewing and the walking through the landscape. The colours are very intense in places - is that easier to do with dyed fabric and yarns than with paints?

Carol Naylors machine embroideries - definitely brings a distortion to the ground that drawing would not necessarily bring (or bring in a different way with the water effect on paper). The stitches distort the canvas in a way that makes you aware that the plants change the shape of the ground they grow in. Also machine stitching is intrinsically linear, reflecting the lines made by linear ploughing and planting of the lavender.

Heather Dubreil's art quilts - Not sure what it brings - would the same images made of coloured paper or painted in oil have less impact or interest? I don't think so necessarily, which suggests that the use of textiles is not adding any particularity to this piece of work. (But I could well be missing something).

Caroline Dunn's landscapes feel more personal, the walk round her home, and are made in traditional quotidian manner by sewing. To me this adds warmth and homeliness to her images.

Landscape - drawings

A walk in the park

Charcoal and pale grey conte crayon in sketchbook.
Looking at it now I can see that there needs to be more of a middle tone behind the trees and sign.
Also that there should be at least one person or dog!

A little house hidden behind huge bushes. I am drawn to these kind of scenes,
where you are pulled in to something half hidden.
The difficulty with this one was differentiating the highly textured bushes from the house,
which was quite well hidden behind and between them. Also that the tone of the bushes was had to get right.
Someone I know was jogging and spotted me and I didn't manage to keep going for much longer with an audience.

I enjoy looking at this view because of the feeling of space. It's difficult to believe it's in the middle of London.
The paths across the grass cut it almost geometrically, taking into account the undulating shape of the ground.
In the distance, the detail isn't obvious, and I made a note that I don't have to know what's actually there, just what the tone changes are.Aware that there is more detail in the foreground because of the grass and dead leaves at the edge of the path I'm sitting on, but I didn't think of drawing them in at the time.

This one was done as it got dark, in a little courtyard between two buildings.
There was a lot of contrast between the darkness of the tree and the light coming
from the windows. I used a charcoal pencil and a B pencil, and a rubber.
I'm pleased with the way the leaves on the ground came out,
and that the perspective is not too far off.

Sketchbook variations exploring tone and colour

Lake with ducks - tone only, using black and silver pencils on white paper

Lake with ducks using temperature of colour only
The green was a little darker than the blue which complicated matters.
Putting in the yellow showed the highlights which were not in my 'tone' sketch above.

Lake with ducks using tone and mark as suggested by tutor.
Lost a bit of tone with the detail again, especially at the edge of the water.
Enjoyed doing the water this way. Could try doing clouds like this too.

Landscape 360 degree sketches

The idea was to sit in one place, and do 4 sketches, turning a quarter of the way round a circle each 15 minutes so as to have a completely different view. This also has the advantage of showing you, as it did me, that you don't have to deliberately pick a view in order to be able to get a reasonable composition - because you get to chose where the edges of the picture are.

I was in Cheltenham and found a bench on the footpath between the station and the town centre which had reasonably open views on all sides.

This one of tree and railings took me a bit more than 15 minutes
because I got caught up with the detail of the tree.
I used charcoal, graphite, and grey conte crayon, and the white of the paper.
The way natural things appear between railings is appealing, and
I wonder if I could use that as a pattern for something.

This one of a streetlight looks now as if there is snow on the ground, but it was grass. I didn't quite know how to show the grass and the leaves fallen onto it other than with small shadows like I did over to the left under the bushes there. I can see now that I got the perspective wrong in the right half, and that I forgot about some of the tree trunks. And the man walking is far too large! 

The third 15 minute sketch was of an interesting curve in the path,
but was brought to a sudden end by a downpour.

Landscape - research point

Landscape is such a huge subject for artists. It's natural to want to depict the parts of the world that we live and move in. The exercise is to research artists from different eras who use landscape as their main subject, and some suggestions ahve been made - Albrecht Durer, Claude Lorrain, LS Lowry, George Shaw, and Sarah Woodfine. I'm going to have a look at those, and follow my preferences to see what else I can find.

Albrecht Durer 15th century

Albrecht Durer, Landscape with Cannon

I know and admire his drawing and woodcut work for its detail. Feeling awed at the time and focus it must have taken him to just sit and get it all down.

This one, of landscape with canon, gives me this feeling. There's a quality of messiness in the landscape which reflects what it is like to try to take in all the detail, and makes the viewer feel all business. Theres a feeling of space in the valley, probably due to the contrast of it being much less detailed, and then the detailed village cutting across in the middle background. The size and detail of the tree and the stones on the foreground ground give something of a frame to it, and emphasise the perspective. The presence of a cannon and soldiers in this rural scene must have some meaning, but not sure what 600 years later.

However, what I found on further exploration of his landscapes, was that many of them are obviously sketches, and that he was probably the first artist to use watercolour for landscapes.

Landscape near Segonzano in the Cembra Valley
Albrecht Durer

This one is an example - I was in doubt as to whether it was by Durer until I spotted the detail on the furthest hill, which is very much like the other works I am familiar with. (And the signature!) What I see here is:
Composition - that furthest, most detailed and dark hill at a sweet spot in the composition;
Colour - subtle variations in the watercolour across it, with the most colour contrast at the horizon
Tone - sketched in to suggest shapes in the foreground, detailed and more intense on the hill to focus attention
Unfinished - some filling in of intermediate levels of tone and detail on the hill to the right, suggesting that this was a sketch he never finished. This and the use of watercolour makes it feel remarkably contemporary.

Albrecht Durer Landscape with a Woodland Pool
From British Museum online collection

This is another of his watercolour landscapes - BM says 'This is one of his most sensitive and atmospheric portrayals of nature'  - thought to be outside Nuremberg.

Again, it has the look of a sketch done on site, with no particular meaning other than to show what he sees. There is an apparently unfinished part in the bottom right. I find this one a little unsettling, presumably this being what 'atmospheric' means.

Tone: There seems to be more light in the background than the foreground, with the areas of lightest tone being just underneath the strong clouds, and in the untouched white paper on the 'beach' on the right, and the strongest tone being in the nearest parts of the pool and the detail of the clouds and pine tree tops across the painting 2/5 or a third down.

Composition: The most intense parts are the foreground of the pool, and the clouds above at the golden mean reflecting this and intensifying the heaviness of it close to us. There are green pines in top right and green grass bottom and bottom left giving a sort of diagonal band of detail. Opposite this are two areas of bleakness in the truncated trees middle left and empty ground bottom right.

Detail of poolside grasses from Landscape with a Woodland Pool (britishmuseum)

Colour: The colours are apparently natural colours, with not much in the way of blueing or greying due to distance. One of the things that make it look like a sketch is that it looks like he was using a limited palate of colours and not mixing much. The grasses in the foreground are suggested by the brushstrokes and addition of a bit of blue.

Albrecht Durer Quarry
copied from hannahmaydegree.blogspot.com

 This one is more comfortable to look at, with the familiar awed feeling regarding the detail and accuracy of his drawing. Obviously a sketch as it stops completely outside the areas of interest to him.
Composition is therefore less of an issue, but there is lots of interest here which keeps your eyes moving round. This is provided by the areas of deeper tone (middle, top left and bottom left), and one of greater  tonal contrast at the 2/5 line vertically; by the areas of detail which correspond broadly to the tone areas; and by the colour contrasts at bottom left, and the higher horizontal lines of bluegrey in the orange.

There is a feeling of hugeness which can only be because of the tiny spindly trees.
And of the warmth of the orange/ sepia colour, again presumably because of the contrasting grey-blue colour. This one has a lot more evidence of mixing colours to get them right.

Durer The Trefileria on Peignitz
again copied from hannahmaydegree.blogspot.com

Looking it up online, trefileria appears to mean wire factory. Can this be right? Is this the 15th century equivalent of that? With a millstone in the middle! Not sure. The composition, with the buildings so close they crowd into the space, makes this landscape more of a study of the angles of the buildings and their relationships to each other. Durer has used tone to make them three dimensional, and this and colour to show that the landscape behind is receding into the distance. The detail is in the bottom left building, and the more intensely dark doorway in the front mid-right, and there is again a contrasting diagonal from left back to front right. There is an obvious area of vagueness in the middle ground. I'm not sure I understand the message or meaning of this painting. And there is something a bit blocky about it that I don't 'get'.

Durer Antwerp Harbour

This ink line drawing is refreshingly 'simple' after the watercolour paintings. No tone, other than that given by greater concentration of detail. There are large blank areas and a dramatic diagonal line in the composition which is satisfying as well as illuminating the perspective. Again the detail is in the further parts of the harbour rather than, as one might expect, the nearer boats, drawing the eye into it.


Claude Lorrain 17th Century

'Designed landscapes based on classical proportions'.

Claude: Landscape with Country Dance 1640-1
from Liber Veritas at British Museum

This detailed sketch in ink and wash in 2 colours is part of his liber veritas (book of truth) which he used as a sketchbook and also to record his paintings so people couldn't copy them. It is of an actual country dance at Malvern Castle, but the composition is carefully contructed according to classical rules. The zigzag of the cows, dancers and castle is pleasing, and the looming trees frame it off centre in a typical way. The two colours of wash (brown and grey) are used to provide a range of tone, with the deepest tone being at bottom left and in the trees to provide the classical framing. The lightest tone in the sky next to the darkest tree, and in reflection at a classical section point in the middle of the dance. It is very romanticised rather than realistic, suggesting that it is intended to be taken as a rural ideal to entertain and delight rather than a document of record.

A Spectator article by Michael Proger (22 October 2011) says:

'despite turning his attentions from pies and patisserie to painting he never lost his love for confection'

Claude: View of Tivoli
Taken from hoocher.com, at the 

This is a more natural looking landscape - a sketch done during Claude Lorrain's visit to Rome. Again composition is very important, and indicated by tone, but in this one it is simpler and less mannered, giving the drawing a more spontaneous look to it. Done in ink, wash and chalk.

Here are some of his more familiar 'ideal' landscapes, which he did for aristocratic patrons - apparently he was shrewd and died wealthy. He was friends with Poussin, also known for ideal landscapes.

Claude - View of La Crescenza - oil on canvas
metmuseum.org

Claude: The Ford
oil on canvas
from metmuseum. org

Claude: Queen Esther approaching the palace of Ahasuerus
pen and brown ink, brown wash over black chalk, heightened with white 
from metmuseum.org

Meaning: These landscapes are deliberately constructed for entertainment and to allow his patrons to show off. Claude landscape paintings were important to my mother and therefore part of my fine art education and development. To me they represent elitism and the appropriation of art by the aristocracy (and the plutocracy) deliberately separating themselves from the other people of the world. We are so rich/ educated/ refined, that you couldn't possibly appreciate fully/ deserve what we have. Perhaps this is envy speaking, but I like to think it's because I enjoy my more visceral response to nature, and to landscapes which capture the combination of unpredictability and complex repetitiveness in nature. Even his trees look as though they were made by skilled craftsmen rather than by the tree tapping the sunlight. I obviously feel strongly about this but don't quite know where to go with it. Perhaps I will work this out a bit more while I'm doing this module!

L.S.Lowry and the others will have to wait for another day.

Landscape - cloud drawings

Exercise 1: Cloud formations and tone

Ok, so I took a long time to get round to this one, because I was daunted at the very thought of trying to draw clouds. And some days there didn't seem to be any. Or the whole sky was grey and flat! But that was of course just an excuse and in the end I went out to Brockwell Park and found some good ones.

 This was looking down a hill at some looming grey clouds in a pile on top of each other.

I tried using a combination of charcoal, graphite and eraser. I didn't make the shapes distinct enough.












For this one, I noticed that the colours were not just grey and white, but that there was a more creamy colour in the mix, and I used chalk to put those parts in.

Again, it's a bit vague-looking, but more like the real thing.

 I noticed this cloud that looked as if it had lacy edges. I think my shaping of the cloud was a bit more successful on this one. I tried putting the lacy edging on but it came out very much larger than it was in real life. The lines of pale grey cloud around it were there, but there was more graduation of tone.

This sketch is of the clouds as well, but shows a bit of the horizon too as it had some interesting shapes. It was a little hazy, as it is in the sketch, but yet again I have not managed to employ a wide enough range of tone.

This one was done on a different day, from the window of a train on a very wet grey day. You can see the blue right at the bottom in the only place where the sky was visible.

I was quite pleased with the way this one feels heavy and grey, and the diagonal shapes in the cloud.

Project 2 Physical and Visual Texture

Exercise 1
Experimenting with different ways to represent texture in drawing.

My attempts to show the texture of (from top left to bottom right)
pompom, loofah, old suede, and crushed velvet.

This was trying some combinations of wet and dry media

This time starting with wet paper

Frottage with tinfoil, loofah, knitting