One of my favorite books about painting is an old classic, Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting by John Carlson. Some of the material is copyrighted as early as 1929--almost 100 years ago! But the advice is timeless.
Carlson's students painted mostly small to mid-sized paintings. But he urged them to occasionally take on a large canvas. He said that facing a large expanse of clean canvas gives the painter a sense of power. However, he cautions that one MUST organize and draw and paint well when working in a large format. In his words, "A large pictures shows up ANY lack whatsoever. What was (in a small sketch) a tree, made with one touch of green paint, becomes on a large canvas a formidable mass that requires construction." Therein lies the struggle!
I have recently painted several 12 x 12 inch canvases. I love that size, and feel very comfortable with it. So I decided to take some of the ideas expressed in that format and go bigger. Hence the title of this post, "Supersized". As a result of my work, I can definitely vouch for this statement by Carlson: "Any fault of composition shoots out with cruel obviousness from a large canvas." A slight inaccuracy might be acceptable in a small work, but it is glaringly (or in Carlson's words, "cruelly") obvious in a large format. Care is the watchword.
I'm illustrating this post with some of my recent efforts in the large scale format. The top two images are a great illustration of what happens to me taking a small image to a large format. The top image is the 12 x 12 canvas. The second is the 30 x 30 rendition of the same subject. Vive la difference!
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