Stanley Bielen | Painting OWU

Color Massing II

November 20, 2014 § 5 Comments

Describing a breakthrough he had while struggling with a landscape painting, 19th century American painter, Albert Pinkham Ryder wrote, “…the old scene presented itself…and before my eyes , framed in an opening between two trees. It stood out like a painted canvas…three solid masses of form and color: sky, foliage, and earth. The whole was bathed in an atmosphere of golden luminosity. I threw my brushes aside; they were too small for the work at hand. I squeezed out big chunks of pure, moist color, and taking my palette knife, I laid on blue, green, white, and brown in great sweeping strokes. As I worked, I saw that it was good and clean and strong. I saw nature springing into life upon my dead canvas! Exultantly I painted until the sun sank below the horizon. Then I raced around the fields like a colt let loose and literally bellowed for joy!” *

A gallery of color massings from the centuries:

From Painters on Painting*, edited by Eric Protter

Weekly Object Painting

January 18, 2011 § 1 Comment

“The day is coming when a single carrot, freshly observed, will set off a revolution.” – Cezanne

“With an apple I will astonish Paris.” – Cezanne

“Seeing is the initial act of valuing, and the nature and infinite potential of human beings to see and to aesthetically order the world is the one pure subject of art.” – Robert Irwin, “The Hidden Structures of Art,” 1993

Some inspirations to guide your studies: