In ‘Bright Earth: Art and the Invention of Color’, Philip Ball discusses the problems that artists can run into by not paying enough attention to the craft of painting. A 20th century example are Mark Rothko’s Harvard murals that, painted in dark pink and crimson, turned light blue – presumably because of the fugitive Lithol red that, naturally, is now no longer accepted as artist material.
Reading ‘Bright Earth’ inspired me to devote the winter holidays to learning more about pigments. At first, I reread the description of the various artist’s oil on the dickblick.com.
Currently, I am mostly relying on The Color of Art: Pigments, a website that provides comprehensive pigment information on chemical composition, color description and long term effects of light, opacity, lightfastness, oil absorption and toxicity.
This research led me to eliminate some of my most cherished oil paints that are reputed to be of low toxicity: PV23-dioxane violet because of its imperfect lightfastness and PR209-quinacrinidone red because its pinkish red hue can shifts towards bluish.
The upshot is that I will, exercising caution, resort to the more toxic pigments, PV16-Manganese violet or PV14-cobalt violet and PR108 cadmium red.
A new beginning, mixing new colors.
Have you ever drastically revised your palette?
Birgit, I’m not a painter but I just wanted to leave a quick comment on the photo you posted, which is lovely. I enjoy taking “still life” photos around my home as I find them peaceful and calming.
I’m also trying to remember the substance many 19th century European painters used that over time left a dark, black pall over their paintings. This has happened to some of Delacroix’s works.
It’s on the tip of my tongue…
Tree,
I am glad that you like my photo.
I left the ‘Bright Earth’ book in Europe for Karl to read. Searching it on amazon.com for ‘Delacroix’, ‘black’, ‘darken’, I only came up with one line: ‘greens darken to black’.
I will buy another copy of the book to have it with me as a reference on my future trip to Italy. Ball’s book inspired me to buy the Rosetta Stone for learning Italian. I am planning a Studienfahrt (is there an English term?) study Italian Renaissance painting.
Folks:
You may may be looking for bitumen.
Yes, it finally came to me. Bitumen.
Birgit, study time in Italy sounds wonderful. You could probably spend a lifetime there studying Renaissance art.
I hear Rosetta Stone works well, please let me know what you think.
Tree, so far, I love it. But it has only been one week!
Jay, you are responsible for my new directions, having recommended Philip Ball’s ‘Bright Earth’ to me.
Birgit,
Your photo is delightful, it makes me think somehow of a spare, Benedictine monastery. It’s especially intriguing because I can’t figure out that enigmatic shape on the table. A crumpled paper?
Ignorance of materials can be fairly called a failure of craft, but I’ve also become increasingly attracted to more fugitive artworks that are not meant to last. Andy Goldsworthy is a famous example, but I’m thinking more of all the ephemeral works I see tossed off by art students.
A photographer a few years ago drew a lot of attention for his treatment of burying prints in the ground for a period of time. It was partly a conceptual gimmick, but the effects of decay can also be quite lovely. A digital photographer with no integrity, such as myself, perhaps, can have it both ways: subject some prints to degrading environments, and keep others pristine. In fact, that’s giving me an idea…
Steve,
A scapula to hold a pen or pencil.
A Benedictine monastery or Troels’ minimalism. The desk looks very different, cluttered with a lap top and toys, when family and friends come to visit.
Ephemeral can be a virtue. Toshiko Takaezu makes the students in her workshops destroy their ceramic pieces. If I remember correctly from her video, she does that to encourage them to experiment boldly.
What a curious idea – digital photography lacking integrity.
Birgit:
My congrats to Troels and his minimalism. He – and maybe the two of you- have achieved a state of grace to which many aspire. But I do have to ask: does that orderliness extend to proportions? It appears that the width of the table in the image is half the span of the windows, and everything is lined up neatly to show that. The photograph is quite graceful with a sense of natural laws at work in the trees, set within a quiet feeling of human order.
Speaking of ephemera, my son Adam is an actor, and so often the plays in which he performs, with all their castings, negotiations, memorizing, blocking out, sets and costume designing and making, lighting and putting on for audiences drawn from near and far, are then, as the last curtain falls, relegated to a few stills and videos and the vagaries of ever fading memory. But you look ahead in theater – not back.
Steve:
Any Goldsworthy should be famous by sheer virtue of his or her name alone. Received a coffee table book for the holidays which turned out to be an Andy G. knockoff. At times like this one can see the difference between talent and plagiarism – and not a very talented plagiarism at that.
Jay,
You are my third friend whose son is an actor.
As for the proportions in the image, the window was chosen by me but Troels found the table at a local carpenter and lined it up with the window. Our impression had been that the table was wider than the window from sitting there and looking out. Reading your comments, we realized that the widths do match!
Birgit,
I like the verticals of the trees, which seem goal-oriented or headed toward something (heaven?) which contrast so well with the calmness of the interior scene, with its window and table and chair. The off-set table is perfect to add the tweak that keeps it from being too still, too centered. A really fine job — a still life!
June,
Thanks, this place restored my sanity after family business abroad and flying back from Schiphol to Detroit a couple of days after the ‘Christmas bomber’ .
Birgit, my curiosity has the best of me. One thing I was struck with in your photo is that the table looks identical to one I own. Is your table by any chance an Arts and Crafts/Mission style table?
Tree
Wow! I will ask the Craftsman/Carpenter next time that I will be ‘Up North’.