New Life for Old Things

 

I thought that my fellow painters, and non-painters as well, might enjoy seeing how I have repurposed some everyday items to serve a studio function.  Finding new use for things is fun for me.  I guess that's why I am a pack rat.  I tend to ask myself "What can I do with this?", rather than "Can I live without this?"  

A prime example is the standard file folder rack from any office supply store.  It is perfect for holding wet paintings while they dry.  I have several of these, and I also use them for organizing completed paintings from a series.  One rack might be marked "Pears", and another "Apples".  (Another personal fixation is for labeling...).

An easy hack: using garden gloves in the studio.  Peggi Kroll Roberts tipped me off to the Atlas brand, and I find that that they are far superior to disposable latex gloves.  For one thing, you can easily take them on and off (unlike latex gloves, which become sweaty and uncooperative).  For another thing, they last a long time and are more earth-friendly than disposables.

Last winter after my paper white bulbs died, I kept the vase and pebbles they had grown in.  It turns out to be a perfect spot to park wet brushes after I have washed them--they can go bristles down, so the water doesn't run into the ferrule, and the pebbles keep the bristles from resting in any runoff water.  Perfect solution!

Last but not least, there is the little rubber sculpting tool that I was introduced to by Tracy Everly.  Who knew that a simple little thing could be so helpful?!  It's intended for potters and clay artists, but I use it to move paint around, when I don't want the super sharp line of a palette knife.  I like its flexibility and size.  Sort of like an extension of your fingers.

The sculpting tool used to be red.  Now it is the ubiquitous gray that results from accumulating layers of dried paint.  I guess this post goes to prove the old adage that my husband often reminds me of:  "If it CAN get paint on it, it WILL get paint on it."  So true!

It's Back!

Torrit Greys

This week I got an announcement that the 2021 Torrit Grey has hit the shelves!  Years ago, I was befuddled by a similar promotion at the local art supply store, which promised me a free tube of Torrit Grey paint if I bought a certain amount of goods made by Gamblin. Nowadays, I am a huge fan, and eagerly await each year's release of Torrit Gray.  Here's the story...

Gamblin Artists Colors is one of the largest paint manufacturers in the US. Their factory uses an air filtration system made by a company called Torit. The air filters trap pigment dusts that escape into the air during the paint mixing process. Every spring, Gamblin cleans the dust out of its filters. Instead of dumping the pigment dust in a landfill, they use it to make a special paint, which they call "Torrit Grey". How cool is that?

Because the combination of pigments cleaned out of the filters is never the same from year to year, the color Torrit Grey is never the same either. Recently, Gamblin has started labeling the tubes of Torrit Grey with the year of manufacture. So now we can collect tubes from various "vintage years", if you will, just like we would collect wines from different vintage years. It's a limited edition pigment!

Not only is Gamblin's approach very earth-friendly, it has the added lure of the mysterious: You never know what the next batch will be like until you open it. It often tends toward green, because one particular pigment, Pthalo Green, has an extremely strong tinting strength. Sometimes it is a truer neutral gray, like the 2013 vintage shown below.

Torrit Grey is great mixed with other colors. In his book "Landscape Painting Inside & Out", Kevin Macpherson advocates for scraping your palette as you work, and stashing the scrapings on the side, to be used in mixing other colors. Many painters call this their "mud". Kevin even suggests buying empty tubes and filling them with your mud, rather than discarding it at the end of a painting session...another great recycling approach. Here's to more earth-friendly ideas!

The Right Brush

A friend visited my studio recently, and when she saw my work area, she asked "Why do you need so many brushes??".  Why indeed.  That's like asking a woman why she needs so many shoes.

To pursue the shoe analogy: you have some shoes for evening, some for day, some for country walks, some for city sidewalks.  In painting, you have some brushes for fine line work, some brushes for heavy impasto application, some brushes for smoothing.  I paint in many sized formats, ranging from those you can hold in your hand, to those you can hang over your mantel.  Different sizes of brushes are needed to work on such different sizes of substrates.  On a large canvas, you want to be able to cover the territory energetically and efficiently, which requires some large brushes.

Brushes also come in different types, based on the shape of the bristles.  "Flats" make nice, hard-edged shapes.  "Filberts" make rounded shapes.  And so forth.  A good painting involves a variety of lines and brushstrokes.  It's hard to create that variety without different kinds of brushes. It helps to have all weapons ready for battle!

And finally there's the issue of wear and tear.  Brushes don't last forever, so it's helpful to have backups at hand.  Certain types of very small brushes are particularly short lived.  Check out the photo above, showing the short life cycle of a "0" sized brush.  It doesn't take long to go from a few short hairs down to just a nub.  The more you paint, the faster they wear down.  It's a peril of the painter's life!

Can't Live Without, Part II

By popular demand:  Things I Can't Live Without, Part II.  The scoop in this post will have studio tips for fellow painters, and a peek behind the scenes of a working studio, for you non-painters. Actually, I'm only talking about one item this time: Gaffer Tape.

"Gaffer" is a strange name, no? A "gaffer" is the head electrician on a movie or TV set. Gaffer tape gets its name because it is the preferred tape for use on the film sets. Wikipedia calls it "a heavy cotton-cloth pressure sensitive tape, with strong adhesive and tensile properties".  Strong is an understatement.  If two things are capable of being held together, gaffer tape will hold them. 

I love gaffer tape for so many reasons.  I've used it to hold an umbrella in place when plein air painting. I've used it to repair equipment that breaks during a painting trip. 

I also use gaffer tape to finish paintings for presentation. I often  paint on loose pieces of linen. Later, when they are dry, I mount them on panels. Unlike most people, I don't cut off the overhanging edges of the linen after mounting, because that leaves the raw edge of the panel showing. Instead, I wrap the linen around the panel. Wrapping can leave the back of the panel looking messy, like this:

But I use my trusty gaffer tape to finish the back side of the panel. I paint the raw panel with gray gesso. It ends up with a clean, professional look. Check it out below:

Gaffer tape is also great for covering the white edges of stretched canvas, when the painting is going to be put in a floater frame. Darkening the edges insures that no bits of raw white canvas will be visible when the painting is framed. Many times I just paint the edges of the canvas black with an acrylic paint or gesso. But oil primed linen won't accept those materials. So presto: gaffer tape to the rescue!~

I'm sure I'm overlooking other uses of gaffer tape. But you can see why I love it! Stay tuned for more "Can't Life Without" to come...

Can't Live Without...

If you're interested in the nitty gritty stuff that goes on behind the scenes in the studio, this post is for you! I'm writing about three somewhat oddball things that I can't live without.

#1:  100% cotton rags. Why, might you ask, are paper towels not good enough? Well, they are OK for many things,  but not all. When I am toning a canvas and wiping it firmly to spread the color evenly, paper towels fall apart and leave little crumbs of paper all over the canvas. Sometimes even the cotton rags end up with holes in them--but at least they don't leave debris on the canvas. I have friends (who shall remain nameless) who supply me with old T shirts whenever they clean out their closets. Can't thank them enough!

#2: Plastic Squeeze Bottles. My very first painting instructor suggested putting one's medium in a plastic squeeze bottle, instead of pouring it into a metal cup. Dipping your brush back into the same cup of medium throughout a painting session is a sure way to end up with dirty medium. With a squeeze bottle, you squeeze out medium as it is needed, and the rest stays nice and clean in the bottle. Ingenious.

#3: White Artist's Tape. I use this to tape off my canvas in the dimensions of the painting I am working on.  It helps me define my rectangle, and lets me work in any dimension I choose. And there are few joys greater than pulling the tape off when the painting is finished, and seeing the "reveal", with clean, crisp edges. Check it out below:

An added plus: at the end of a painting trip when I strip all the tape off my plein air paintings, the used tape takes on the form of a modern sculpture.  See the last image, and judge for yourself!  If you'd like a future installment of more "Things I Can't Live Without", send me a comment and let me know. (You can comment directly on this blog, or reach me through my website at lesleypowellart.com).  Thanks!

Tool Time

I'm not sure who said it, but it's definitely true:  "You think with the tool that's in your hand." Lately I've been challenging myself to think in terms of bigger shapes, and to mix larger pools of paint on my palette. It helps me achieve these goals if I have a BIG implement in my hand to apply the paint to the canvas.

In the top photo, I'm using a very large taping knife that I bought at the hardware store. I think it's actually designed to smooth joints when hanging drywall, but who's counting?! I have several similar tools from the hardware store, in varying sizes. Carlos San Millán first introduced me to these tools for painting. He is a master with them. They can create a nice, sharp edge, if you load them with paint and just touch the edge to the canvas. Or they can produce a broad swath of paint, if you drag them across the canvas. 

At the opposite end of the spectrum, I have a series of small "drawing" brushes. Some of these have only a few hairs left! They are ideal for directional lines, or for going back into bigger passages of paint to make corrections or definitions. 

And then there are a few specialty brushes. Just above is one of those. I think it's meant for watercolors, but I use it to smooth out backgrounds or skies, when my brushstrokes have become too choppy and detract from the painting. A very light few swipes with this brush can smooth the choppiness, without destroying the shape of the strokes.

Maggie Siner's Toolbox

Of course, there are dozens of brushes that fall between these extremes, and in fact those in-betweens are the core players in my painting practices. But it's always good to vary your tools. Using different tools results in varied types of paint strokes, which make for a more exciting painting. As they say, if you're only using one or two brushes for your painting, you will put the viewers to sleep. Variety is the spice of life--it definitely increases the enjoyment of looking!

The Painter & The Sketchbook

Da Vinci Sketchbook

Greetings from Paris! I have been taking in the museum exhibits here, and it is like drinking from the proverbial firehose. Way too much to digest at once! So many thoughts, so many sights, so many emotions. For this post, I will share just one thought--a thought that has been reinforced with each and every exhibit I have seen: a painter is never without a sketchbook at hand. 

 Palezieux Sketchbook

Giacometti Sketchbook

This, of course, is not new news. It's a time honored practice. and even in the 21st century, experts on creativity admonish us painters to keep our sketchbooks handy. So I have a new resolution, and you can guess what it is!

Giacometti Sketchbooks

It's thrilling when special exhibits include the artists' sketchbooks. Seeing them allows you to take a peek inside the painters' minds. I love to look at the sketches--they are the birthplace of ideas.  Alas, the sketchbooks are in glass cases, but at least they are open to selected pages, and at least I can see the size of the notebook, the type of paper, and the way the ideas were crammed in. 

Da Vinci Notebook

I'm illustrating this post with photos of sketchbooks of Degas, da Vinci, Alberto Giacometti, and also some lesser knowns. Each unique, each illustrative of the mind of the artist. Enjoy!

Willem Basiaan Tholen Sketchbooks

Degas Sketchbook

Remains of the Day

My palette at the end of the day

One of my grandmother's favorite sayings was "Waste not, want not". And since I was raised by parents who grew up during the depression, the discipline of thrift was definitely part of my upbringing! As a result, I hate to let any of my painting supplies (most of which are very expensive) go to waste.

I learned years ago from Kevin Macpherson that he scrapes up all the remnants of paint from his palette at the end of the day, and makes a big puddle of "mud". This "mud" is a usually a mid- to dark- toned neutral (an example of mine appears above). It is perfect for blending with other colors! Neutrals like this add a richness and depth to colors from the tube, and help reduce their value and lessen their intensity. These are good things to do, because much of a landscape painting is composed of midtones that are not brilliant in intensity. You can see some examples in the color wheel below. It shows what happens when a midtone gray is added to a pure yellow, orange, red, violet, blue or green.

Photo courtesy Gamblin Oil Colors

If you are so inclined, you can purchase ready-made tubes of various mid-tone grays, such as one of the Portland Grays, manufactured by Gamblin. But I find that the puddles of mud scraped up from my palette stand me in pretty good stead as neutrals. I even save mine by storing them in empty tubes that you can buy in art supply stores. 

Another benefit of saving the "remains of the day" is that it encourages me to squeeze out plenty of paint at the beginning of the session. Many painters (including me) have a tendency to scrimp on paint, which definitely have a negative impact on the painting process. Since I know that none of my paint will go to waste, I feel free to squeeze out liberal portions. So here's to thriftiness and a low waste process!

Working Space

Table in Cezanne's studio, Aix-en-Provence

Paul Cezanne, Still Life with Fruit Dish

I am always fascinated by painter's studios. It's especially intriguing to visit "preserved" studios of some of the great masters in the history of art. If you know an artist's body of work, seeing his or her studio often brings a shock of the familiar. What art lover could possibly visit the studio of Cezanne in Aix-en-Provence (seen in this post), and not recognize some of the objects that feature so prominently in his wonderful still lifes? Not to be missed, not if you love Cezanne, not if you love those apples!

Paul Cezanne, "Still Life with Plaster Cupid"

And of course Cezanne's huge north-facing window makes my heart go pitter-patter. That exposure provides ideal light for painting. I noticed that he had curtains specially arranged

Time Passing...

Who can't help but think about time during this season, when we turn the calendar page to a New Year? One saying about the benefit of time is that "Time heals all wounds". On a less metaphysical level-- perhaps more mundane, but nonetheless very beneficial for the practicing painter-- the passage of time often allows us to see, and therefore to correct, problems in our paintings.

I'm not an expert on how the human brain works. But I do know that it's very common to get "too close" to a painting--to be so wrapped up in the struggle that you lose sight of the way forward. In those cases, it's smart to put the painting away for a few days, and work on something different. No peeking! Miraculously, when you pull the painting back out,

Undertones

Undertones. Hmmm, sounds a little bit sinister, doesn't it?  But toning a canvas before starting to apply paint is anything but! In fact, for most painters, it's an essential first step in the painting process. (For the uninitiated, "toning" a canvas refers to putting a thin layer of color down on the raw white canvas, as shown in the top photo). 

There are many different reasons that painters tone their canvases. Here are a few:

Photo from Bill Guffey

(1) Some painters use a medium value, neutral, gray tone, so that when they start to apply color, they can readily compare

Behind the Scenes

Lesley in Provence

Lots of you are curious about the steps involved in painting abroad and getting those paintings back home to the States. Especially when one paints larger paintings, or lots of them: How do you get them all safely home, and ready to hang?

When I embark, I take my blank canvas (mostly Belgian linen) rolled up in a sturdy mailing tube. Having long rolls of canvas allows me to select any size for any particular subject. That provides much more flexibility than painting on pre-cut panels! I also take a piece of plywood, as large as will fit in my suitcase, to tape the canvas on, thus providing a sturdy support for painting.

Canvas clipped to board...

Usually I quit painting a few days before returning home, so the paintings have time to dry. Then I roll the finished paintings back up--painted surface facing outward--and put them