Announcing Maggie Siner's Landscape Workshop

Painting on location in Maggie Siner's workshop

It has become an annual ritual in recent summers--participating in Maggie Siner's total immersion painting workshop in France. Yes, total immersion is the key. It is the closest thing I have ever experienced to living in the proverbial artists' colony, where concerns of the world are far away, and energies are focused exclusively on painting. 

We are lodged in a charming little hamlet in Provence, in structures dating back to the 1500's. The French word for "hamlet" is "hameau". I am told that a true "hameau" consists of ancient farm buildings that have been repurposed to form a community of small dwellings. In our case, one of the buildings used to be a stable or barn. It has been lovingly restored, and now houses a painting studio, with sweeping views over the Luberon valley. Sometimes it's hard to keep my mind on the critique of the day's work, when my eyes are drawn outside to a magnificent sunset.

"House in the Lavender"
Oil on Canvas, 8 x 11
(c) Lesley Powell 2019
(Available)

Maggie keeps us on our toes, with several painting sessions each day. We go to one location in the morning, and a different location in the afternoon. Maggie chooses the locations so that each one is designed to help us see and implement the lesson she will convey. Sometimes our hosts bring a picnic to us out on location, and we are able to continue painting until sundown. The sun doesn't set until about 9:30 pm, so the painting days are long. The last light of the day is magical.

"Quiet Hamlet"
Oil on Linen, 12 x 8
(c) Lesley Powell 2019
(SOLD)

Dates have been set for 2020--the workshop will run from July 4 to July 11. You can see all the details on the website here. Applications are now being accepted. Time to start dreaming and planning for the summer... 

Announcing Maggie Siner's 2019 Workshop in France

"Les Bassacs Farmhouses"
8 x 12, Oil on Linen
(c) Lesley Powell 2018

Faithful readers know that one of my annual rituals is attending Maggie Siner's painting workshop in Provence. It's a highlight of my year. My husband asks how I can keep going back to the same place, with the same instructor, year after year--he thinks that would get boring. My reply: Au contraire!! I'm excited that the dates have been set for next year (details here).

"Fields near Ochre Woods"
12 x 16, Oil on Linen
(c) Lesley Powell 2018
Available at Huff Harrington Fine Art

Though we stay in the same little hamlet every year, Maggie always scouts out new painting locations. Each location is carefully chosen to help us understand and implement the lesson of the day. The "lessons" are a series of building blocks to help us learn to see and to paint.

I use the term "lessons", but actually the experiences far outstrip that meager word. The workshop is a total immersion

Home from Provence....

"Murs, Beyond the Wheatfields"
12 x 16, Oil on Canvas
(c) Lesley Powell 2018

There is nothing like a total immersion painting experience to re-charge your batteries! I have just returned from three weeks of painting in the south of France. The first week was devoted to a workshop with the immensely gifted painter and teacher, Maggie Siner. The next two weeks were consumed with independent painting--a perfect time to cement some of the lessons from the workshop.

"Fields off Chemin des Pradelles"
12 x 16, Oil on Linen
(c) Lesley Powell 2018

We missed the lavender this year--it had all been harvested by the time we arrived in Provence. But on the bright side, the wheat had also been recently cut. That meant that we got

Guild of Charlotte Artists

(c) Martha Armstrong

I had the honor of speaking recently to the Guild of Charlotte Artists. I prepared a handout, but we ran out of copies, so I promised to post the contents on my blog. Here you go--resources on Perceptual Painting. In this post, I've been able

Between the Notes

"Les Grands Clements"
15 x 11, Oil on Linen
(c) Maggie Siner

I recently read a quotation from Mozart: "The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between." Oh, wow. My mind flew immediately to an analogy with painting. One might say that in painting, the art is not in the objects portrayed, but in the spaces between them. These spaces are often called "negative spaces"--but that term definitely does not do them justice!

"Traghetto"
Oil on Linen
(c) Maggie Siner

Just look at the top painting. The house is nice, yes; and also the tree. But what I really love are the negative spaces between the tree branches, where you glimpse the house between. Those spaces make the painting sing. And in the

Announcing Maggie Siner Master Class 2018

13 x 10, oil on linen
(c) Maggie Siner 2016

Exciting news--the calendar is set for Maggie Siner's painting workshop in France this summer! We will be painting in Provence from July 21 to July 28, 2018.  You can check out the details here. 

Farm with Black Hedge
11 x 17, Oil on Linen
(c) Maggie Siner 2016

We will be staying in the tiny hamlet of Les Bassacs, nestled in the heart of the Luberon. Far from the tourist crowds, we will explore sweeping countryside vistas, ancient perched villages, agricultural fields, and even Roman ruins. Maggie used to live in this area, and she has a native's grasp of the landscape. She has scouted out the painting locations that are

Maggie Siner Workshop Announcement: 2017

(c) Maggie Siner, 2016
Oil on Linen

Exciting news--the dates are set for Maggie Siner's workshop in Provence this summer! We will be painting in Provence from July 8 to July 15, 2017.  You can check out the details here. 

"Wheatfields at Les Lombards"
6 x 13, Oil on Linen
(c) Maggie Siner, 2015

Our location in the Luberon area provides many inspiring painting motifs, ranging from perched villages to sweeping wheat fields and vineyards. And of course, Maggie is an incomparable teacher. Maggie used to live in this area of France, and she knows all of the

Close to Home

(c) Lesley Powell, 2016

One of my favorite days from the recent workshop in Provence with Maggie Siner was the day we painted in and around the tiny hamlet of Les Bassacs. Les Bassacs served as our home during the workshop, and I found that as I got to know it better and better, I grew to love it more and more. This feeling is due in no small part to the hospitality and encouragement of our host (and fellow painter), David Atkinson, and his wife Liz. Better hosts could not be found! 

(c) Robyn Spence, 2016

Sometimes when you become familiar with a place, your eye grows numb to its beauty, and to the potential paintings that it holds. Not so with Les Bassacs, at least not in my case! The top painting is mine, from the morning we painted right in our own backyard. I loved that tall, odd shaped building, and its rough plaster surface and irregular windows. When I saw the interesting shapes presented in the top painting, I just had to grab them. This turned out to

What I Saw at the Abbey

(c) James Currin, 2016

One day during the recent workshop in Provence with Maggie Siner, we painted at the beautiful Abbaye Saint Hilaire. I found myself thinking a lot that day about how light and shadow appear on a structure that is situated in the landscape--and how very quickly those lights and shadows change! Maggie's remarks that day also stimulated me to think about building my composition around an interesting pattern of shapes, both dark and light, rather than simply illustrating the subject.

(c) Bob Dodson, 2016

One of my takeaways from Maggie's lesson that day was to solve the big color blocks first. Only after doing that should I let myself move to smaller events or "details". I loved the way

One, Two, Three...

(c) Maggie Siner, 2016

I have just returned from several weeks in France--the highlight of which was a week long workshop with the inimitable Maggie Siner. We had a wonderful group of ten painters. As always, I learned a great deal from my fellow painters, as well as from Maggie.

One thing I took away from the lessons with Maggie is the benefit of simplifying the landscape into simple shapes. Maggie's related to us some wisdom from Robert D'Arista, which lodged in my mind as the concept that we can

Copying the Masters

I recently read a wonderful essay by Maggie Siner. The essay touched on many different issues of painting, and is well worth reading (and re-reading!). The concluding paragraph  addressed one of my favorite topics--copying the Masters. Maggie wrote that a painter does not copy the Masters in order to "paint like Cezanne" or "paint like Monet", but rather "to learn how different perceptual minds work by re-living the visual experience and world of that painter." I love the idea of re-living the visual experience of Degas, or Manet. What a way to learn!

Maggie wrote that the practice of studying and copying the Masters lets a painter learn which of many approaches to painting truly resonate with him or her. By "copying", I believe that she did not mean actually reproducing the Masters' paintings, but rather mimicking their styles. Learning to see the world as they saw it.

The practice of mimicking the Masters is not limited to painters. The novelist Raymond Chandler admired Ernest Hemingway as the greatest American novelist of his time. So he wrote imitations of Hemingway's prose, in order to absorb what he liked about it. Likewise, Proust wrote a series of articles imitating the styles of the great literary figures Balzac and Flaubert. 

Twyla Tharp, one of the greatest ballet dancers and choreographers of the 20th century,  used a similar approach. As a young dancer, she would stand behind every great dancer then in New York and literally mimic him or her. She said that this imprinted their movements into her own creative DNA.

Yes--we all have our own "creative DNA", which leads to our individual painting styles. Maggie makes a persuasive argument that studying the Masters, far from making one a copycat, helps one harness his own unique predispositions. Here's to learning from the Greats!

Maggie Siner Workshop Announcement: 2016

Yes, the dates are set for 2016! The incomparable Maggie Siner will be teaching her landscape workshop in Provence this summer from July 2 to July 9. It's a perfect time of the year in Provence. We will visit perched villages, lavender fields, vineyards, and wheat fields. Maybe even an ochre quarry. In short, we will see and be challenged by all that Provence has to offer. 

Maggie lived in the Luberon area of Provence for a number of years, and she brings an insider's knowledge of the land and its conditions. If there is a strong wind from the north, Maggie knows a spot where we can paint and be sheltered from the gusts. She has scoped out the best places to take us

Simple Isn't Easy

(c) Maggie Siner, 2015

One of the biggest messages from the recent workshop with Maggie Siner is the importance of simplification, and the power of simple shapes. Simple (but beautiful!) shapes make for  strong paintings. Our very first day, we were challenged to depict the landscape and all of its glorious, expansive space by using just three or four shapes. Yikes!

The proof is in the pudding: if the color relationships are correctly "tuned" among the shapes, that is all you need to make a complete painting. I submit as Exhibit A the top painting, which is from Maggie's own brush. There is no "detail" description, but you know that you are in a wheatfield in the Luberon. No question. Simple and beautiful. Not easy to do.

"La Route d'Uzes"
Nicholas de Stael, 1954

Thinking about this exercise brought to mind my favorite paintings by Nicolas de Stael (1914-1955). De Stael was a Russian immigrant who settled in France. He is known as an abstract painter, but

Wait Until Dark

(c) Maggie Siner, 2015

During the recent workshop in France, our fearless leader, Maggie Siner, urged us on to work well into the nighttime. A full day of painting was not enough--the evening beckoned with nocturnes! Some of the most lovely and original work of the week came during these evening painting sessions. The top photo is one of Maggie's nocturnes, painted in the little hamlet where we stayed. Fantastic! Nobody does it like Maggie! Just below is Bob Dodson's beautiful painting--painted a few yards down the road. I love the surprising stripe of lavender in Bob's painting. And Bob says that somebody inside happened to turn on a lamp just as he was finishing his painting, so he grabbed that beautiful little bit of orange.

(c) Bob Dodson, 2015

Back home, I did a little research on the history of nocturnes. I read that James Abbott McNeill Whistler coined the term "nocturne" as it applies to paintings. Before Whistler,

Patchwork Fields

I have just returned from several weeks of painting in France, so the next few posts will be inspired by that experience. My first week was spent in a workshop led by the gifted instructor Maggie Siner. Maggie lived in this area for years, and knows great spots to paint. One of my favorites was the village of Joucas, from which you could see the sweeping vista pictured above.

The patchwork pattern of the fields in this region is fascinating to me. Though the valley is vast, the scale of the individual fields, and the idiosyncratic way in which they are arranged, give the landscape a very human, approachable feeling. I have learned that

Taking In vs. Looking Out

"Villars"
8 x 12, oil on linen
(c) Lesley Powell 2013

Last week I watched a lecture given by the talented painter Connie Hayes. Like many painters whose work I admire, Connie is a perceptual painter. I was floored by the simple and powerful way she summed up the entire approach to perceptual painting. She remembered hearing these words from her mentor, and having the gestalt experience of the putting them to practice the first time:

The key is to receive the sensation of what you are seeing--not to paint what you are looking at. SEEING is receiving. LOOKING is outward.

Hearing this distinction was an "Ah-ha" moment for me. I have long been told, and tried to implement the practice, that you should "paint what you see, not what you know is there". I've also been told to avoid being too "object oriented". But this inward/outward formulation expressed by Connie Hayes somehow made it all come together. She elaborated by saying that "You look AT something when you name it. But you RECEIVE sensations when you SEE it." Yes, Yes!

"Tulip #32"
12 x 12
(c) Connie Hayes

I have been taught by Maggie Siner to use my peripheral vision as an aid to seeing. It helps keep me from naming the objects I am painting. Instead, it moves me closer to receiving the sensations of what I am seeing. The top painting is one that I have kept for myself, because it was a moment in which I felt that I was truly seeing, and receiving the sensation of what I was seeing. It was not a mountain in the distance, but a beautiful, subtle-colored shape. It was not a vineyard in the foreground, but a bright green angular shape. It was not a hilltop village in the middle distance, but a cluster of colored shapes. I use this painting to help me remember how to see and to receive those sensations.

"Summer Blue"
12 x 12, oil on canvas
(c) Connie Hayes

I am including some paintings by Connie Hayes, so you can see her beautiful work. I should have included the last Connie Hayes painting (below) in my post "Painting by Lamplight". It's a wonderful painting that succeeds marvelously with two different light sources. By the way, Connie, too, says that she saves her "breakthrough" paintings to continue to learn from them. No matter what a painter's level of accomplishment may be, there is always an urge to learn more!

"Inner and Outer Glow"
(c) Connie Hayes

Fill 'er Up!

March 2015

Well, I have FINALLY met my goal--about a year and a half late! If you have been following that long, you know that when I moved into my new studio I made a challenge to myself. I set a goal of filling this jar with empty paint tubes within one year. To meet that goal would require me to be very generous with the application of paint to canvas. I was intent on painting lushly, putting great thick whorls of paint on the canvas. Ha!! Since then, I have signed two lease renewals, and have just now filled the jar. Instead of painting like a millionaire, I'm afraid I have been painting like a pauper. I think I'll empty the jar now, and see how long it takes me to fill it again. I'll see whether I will lessen my elapsed time. I'm betting I will. But perhaps I am by nature a painter who prefers a thin application of paint. As Maggie Siner has said, a big part of painting is resolving the matter of "Man meets Materials"!

Finding your Rectangle

One of the most important steps in creating the composition of your painting is "finding your rectangle". If you don't define the edges of your painting, you can't make a strong composition. Why? Because good composition depends on placement of shapes, and you can't place your shapes if you have not

Perceptual Painting

"Drawbridge"
14 x 18
(c) Frank Hobbs 2013

Today I am tackling a topic that has been on my mind very much of late. It's the moniker "perceptual painting". Most of the painters whose work I admire would be categorized as perceptual painters--and I would be honored if I myself were categorized as a perceptual painter. And yet the term is not a familiar one to most people. So what in the world does it mean?

"Joucas Blue Door"
7 x 15, oil on linen
(c) Maggie Siner 2014

Perceptual painting is an approach to painting that involves working directly from the natural world, and painting what you are seeing. The perceptual painter works from observation (rather than from memory, from photographs, or from imagination). He stands in the presence of the motif, and experiences looking at it. I think a perceptual painter would say that working directly from the subject gives rise to a response that is categorically different than working from a photograph. After all, the human eyes work quite differently than the lens of a camera.

"Hat and Roses"
oil on linen, 26 x 32
(c) Maggie Siner 2012

In the words of Maggie Siner, perceptual painting "assumes a truth about the long education in seeing that is necessary to achieve mastery in painting." It also assumes a serious study of vision, and of how our visual perception works. 

I have written a number of posts about "SEEING". It's an important topic, because seeing is the foundation of successful painting, and it is hard to do!

"Favorite Words"
26 x 32
(c) Phillip Geiger

Perceptual painting is not the same thing as "plein air" painting. Plein air painting, by definition, occurs outdoors, typically with the landscape as the subject. But perceptual painting can happen in the studio (as well as outdoors, of course). And perceptual painting can apply to any subject matter. 

"Abandoned Factory"
(c) Frank Hobbs

I have illustrated this post with paintings by some of my favorite perceptual painters. For those who want to know more, I highly recommend the website Painting Perceptions. I'd be curious to know from my readers--is "perceptual painting" a term that you were very familiar with before reading this post?

New Year, New Exhibit

"Table, Chair & Tray"
oil on linen, 28 x 30
(c) Maggie Siner, 2014

What better way to start the New Year than seeing a solo exhibit by the talented Maggie Siner. Maggie's new show opens in Richmond, VA, on January 2nd, at the Brazier Gallery. There is an opening reception at the Gallery that evening--now that's a way to start the year off with a bang!

I can't make the reception, but you can rest assured that I won't miss the show. I have studied with Maggie