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| "Distant View, Rainy Day" 4.5 x 9.25, oil on linen (c) Lesley Powell 2014 |
I have recently been trying to approach my landscape paintings with an eye toward simplification. I am working to omit needless details, and focus instead on the essence of the subject. So of course my heart leapt up recently
when I read what one critic had written about the great artist Eugene Delacroix: that Delacriox had a precious gift in his "capacity to sacrifice details in order to attain a more durable reality." *
when I read what one critic had written about the great artist Eugene Delacroix: that Delacriox had a precious gift in his "capacity to sacrifice details in order to attain a more durable reality." *
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| "Landscape near Les Lombards" 24 x 36, oil on canvas (c) Lesley Powell 2014 |
Ah, yes. Sacrificing details for a more durable reality. What a wonderful way to put it! More prosaically, I find that putting in too many details weakens my paintings. Anybody can draw in all the telephone poles or the fenceposts---but not everybody can fine tune color relationships in a way that conveys reality.
I used to look for details as a way of bringing interest to my paintings. But over the years I have come to believe that "less is more". This balancing act is part of answering the question of "When is the painting finished?" I like Maggie Siner's answer: It is finished when the complete idea is expressed. I believe that the paintings shown in this post express my complete idea, even though they are scant on details. It's always a challenge to know when the idea is complete, and when it needs more refinement. Stay tuned for more exploration of the line between too much and not enough!
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| "Lavender Fields Forever" 8 x 12, oil on linen (c) Lesley Powell 2014 |
*Quotation from Delacroix, C. Roger-Marx and S. Cottee, (c) 1970, Henri Screpel, Paris.
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