Stanley Spencer: Visionary Painter of the Natural World

Stanley Spencer was a rather good landscape artist.

'Cliveden Woods' by Spencer, familiar #Cookham scene in our current exhibition. @VisitThamesCoUk @AlongTheThames pic.twitter.com/aTX4R0vEoH

— The Spencer Gallery (@SpencerCookham) 8 May 2016

I must get to the Stanley Spencer Gallery at Cookham. Here's the description of the current exhibition

Stanley Spencer: Visionary Painter of the Natural World
24th March to 31st October 2016

Glorious depictions of the natural world, exploring Spencer's consummate skill in a series of exquisitely executed flower paintings, garden vistas and landscapes. Figurative and spiritual scenes amongst these wonderful paintings movingly remind us of the visionary element pervading all of Spencer's work.

Wildcard entries - Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year 2015

You too can be a Wild Card entry to the new Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year competition! Each of the heats are going to have places for 50 Wild Card entries.

All you have to do is:

• enter a heat as a Wild Card
• bring your own easel, canvas and materials
• come to one of the heats at National Trust properties around the country
• paint one of the landscapes in front of the judges

It's first come, first served - click on one of the below links to enter as a Wild Card for your preferred Heat:

• Heat 1: Waddesdon Manor, Bucks: Saturday 25th April
• Heat 2: ​Waddesdon Manor, Bucks: Sunday 26th April
• Heat 3: Trelissick Garden, Cornwall: Sunday 3rd May
• Heat 4: ​Trelissick Garden, Cornwall: Monday 4th May
• Heat 5: ​Lyme Park, Cheshire: Wednesday 27th May
• Heat 6: Lyme Park, Cheshire: Thursday 28th May

You never know - you might impress the judges and win the opportunity to go through to the semi-final!

If you did you could win the prize of a £10,000 commission for the National Trust's permanent collection and become Sky Art Landscape Artist of the Year 2015.

The Wild Card is open to artists who previously applied and were unsuccessful as well as artists who didn't apply.

For full terms and conditions and to apply to become a Wild Card, pick your heat and enter via www.sky.com/tv/show/landscape/article/wild-card

Art Competition: £10,000 prize for Landscape Artists

Read my blog post about the Call for Entries for the Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year 2015 If you're interested in:

• winning a £10,000 landscape art commission from the National Trust
• participating in an art competition which has a number of knockout rounds prior to the final; and
• creating landscape art on television - while Sky Arts film you for a television programme about their brand new competition to find the Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year 2015!

Image for the Landscape Artist of the Year 2015 competition on Sky Arts

In summary you need to:

• be aged 16+
• resident in the UK, Republic of Ireland, Isle of Man or Channel Islands for one year or longer on 2nd February 2015
• be a competent landscape artist in any of the following media Watercolour, Oil Paints, Pencil, Charcoal, Pastel, Acrylic, Alkyds, Mixed Media (including collage) and "Other". Note sculpture or any form of digital media is NOT allowed
• complete and submit and online application form by 12pm (midday) on Friday 20th March 2015 together with images of landscape art completed in the last five years
• not mind being filmed for television while you paint!

Fine Canadian Landscape Art - Auction and Previews

There's an auction of "Fine Canadian Art" being held in Toronto, Canada by Heffel Fine Art Auction House on 27th November 2014. The majority of the works in the catalogue are landscapes.

Heffel Fine Canadian Art Catalogue Cover
The Trapper's Return by Clarence Gagnon

oil on canvas, circa 1909 ~ 1913

signed and on verso signed and titled and titled

21 x 28 3/4 in, 53.3 x 73 cm

$500,000 ~ $700,000 CAD

View the catalogue

You can the works in the auction as follows:

• view the Live Auction Catalogue on the Heffel website - this includes the details of the works and what each is expected to fetch
• by downloading the catalogue from the Heffel website. This includes detailed notes about artists and paintings
• on Issuu - which has the complete catalogue (free) - and provides this widget which allows you to click to read

The Artists

Artists who are new to me who impressed 

These included:

David Brown Milne in 1909

• David Brown Milne (1882-1953) - I liked his watercolours. You can see more of his work on Wikimedia - these include some very fine paintings of the First World War eg Montreal Crater, Vimy Ridge and there is more information on the National Gallery of Canada website
• Clarence Alphonse Gagnon (1881 - 1942) - whose painting is on the cover of the catalogue. A woodcut of the same scene is also included in the sale together with a number of other paintings. He was apparently renowned as a painter of the Canadian winter - with snow being pink in the morning and blue at the end of the day. His landscapes were more 'dreamed about' than painted on the spot - with some being completed in his studio in Paris.  Paysage de Charlvoix is simply stunning!

He invented a new type of landscape - a winter world composed of valleys and mountains, of sharp contrasts of light and shadow, of vivid colours, and of sinuous lines. He ground his own paints, and from 1916 his palette consisted of pure white, reds, blues and yellows.   

National Gallery of Canada profile

• Alfred Joseph (AJ) Casson (1989 - 1992) was a m,ember of the Group of Seven and has a delightful watercolour of birch trees in the auction.

Artists familiar to me

• Lawren Stewart Harris - I was surprised to find out that Harris is Canada's top artist in terms of auction sales. I'd never before seen any of Harris's urban landscapes - his painting of Houses on Gerrard Street is very fine and is on the back cover of the catalogue

Back cover of catalogue: Gerrard Street Houses by Lawren Harris(Estimate $350,000-400,000)

Harris’s depictions of Toronto streets are like portraits. Sometimes poignant, sometimes regal, sometimes sad, each of his buildings can be seen as a sitter whose character, carriage and personality are depicted with exacting skill under Harris’s brush Catalogue

• One of my favourite painters Franklin Carmichael (1890 - 1945) - who has one work in the show. Carmichael's paintings included in the show at the Dulwich Picture Gallery really impressed me - see my blog post about Painting Canada: Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven - Review

Information about the auction

The evening auction is being held at the Park Hyatt Hotel, Queen’s Park Ballroom, 4 Avenue Road, Toronto. 

Works can be seen in previews as follows

• Preview At Heffel Gallery, Vancouver: 2247 Granville Street Saturday, November 1 Through Tuesday, November 4, 11 Am To 6 pm
• Preview At Galerie Heffel, Montreal: 1840 Rue Sherbrooke Ouest Thursday, November 13 Through Saturday, November 15, 11 Am To 6 pm
• Preview At University Of Toronto Art Centre 15 King’s College Circle Entrance Off Hart House Circle Saturday, November 22 Through Wednesday, November 26, 10 Am To pm Thursday, November 27, 10 Am To 12 pm
• Heffel Gallery, Toronto 13 Hazelton Avenue, Toronto Ontario, Canada M5r 2e1 Telephone 416 961~6505, www.Heffel.Com

Paintings of Australian land and landscape at the RA

You can read my review of the new exhibition 'Australia' at the Royal Academy of Arts here - Making A Mark: 'Australia' Exhibition at the Royal Academy - review.

It includes paintings from 1800 through to this year's winner of the Wynne Prize.

Left - Australian Impressionists
Right - Federation Landscapes - in watercolour
'Australia' at the Royal Academy - 21 September 2013 to 8 December 2013
Exhibition organised by the Royal Academy of Arts, London in partnership with the National Gallery of Australia

Given the narrative covering the last 200+ years, I'm aiming to revisit specific aspects of the exhibition on this blog.

The Wynne Prize - Finalists 2013 + their websites

The Wynne Prize ($35,000) for Best Landscape Painting of Australian scenery, or figure sculpture by Australian artists had 773 entries this year - which is marginally down on last year (2012: 783 entries; 2011: 712 entries)

The Wynne Prize is awarded annually for 'the best landscape painting of Australian scenery in oils or watercolours or for the best example of figure sculpture by Australian artists’.

Richard Wynne left a bequest which established the prize.  It's run and judged on an annual basis by the Trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney.  The prize was first awarded in 1897 when the present Gallery opened in its current home next to the Botanical Gardens and Sydney Harbour  (I know - I've been!).

Those whose artwork will be in the exhibition were announced last week.

You can find the Wynne Finalists 2013 listed below.  You can also explore past winners and finalists on the prize webpage on the AGNSW website

• GW Bot - Glyphs and Moon GW Bot is the the exhibiting name of Chrissie Grishin, who was born in Quetta, Pakistan of Australian parents
• Linda Bowden - The others  Linda Bowden is a sculptor
• Jun Chen - North Queensland  Born in China in 1960, Chen migrated to Australlia in 1990 and now lives in Queensland. He graduated from the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts in China in 1986 and converted from being a brush and ink painter in China to using oil paint thickly applied with a palette knife in Australia!
• Xiuying ChenCentral Railway Station, Sydney  
• He is a member of the Australian Chinese Painting Society
• David Collins - Hawkesbury crossing
• Dale Cox - Tract 17 - He paints the geomorphology of the land - above and below the ground.  I'm thinking this one might be in with a chance./li>

Tract paintings in acrylic by Dale Cox
Tract 17 (burning) is bottom right

• Lucy Culliton - Table Cape
• Elisabeth Cummings - Sunrise, The Kimberleys
• Keith Fyfe - Untitled
• Neil Haddon - After the burn, Mt Nelson (a new landscape emerges)
• Nicholas Harding - Yuraygir pandanus with samp oak and pigface
• Belynda Henry - The trees
• Timothy Hutchinson - Back creek, Cowra
• Matt Huttlestone - Hardies Creek, Northern Territory
• Dinni Kunoth Kemarre - My footy heroes
• Fiona Lowry - Alone with you
• Guy Maestri - Last light over Ball’s Pyramid (won the 2009 Archibald Prize)
• Robert Malherbe - Govetts Leap
• Noel McKenna - Centennial Park<
• Shaelene Murray - Blossom
• Yukultji Napangati - Untitled



Winner of 2012 Wynn Prize
Waterfall (after Willams) by Imant Tillers

• Theo Papathomas - Figures dancing
• James Powditch - Kornfield XIV
• Mark Rodda - Alabaster Valley, Tasmania
• Margarita Sampson - Anemone incursions III: puss puss
• Alex Seton - Soloist
• Imants Tillers - Namatjira (won the 2012 Wynne Prize)
• Aida Tomescu - Sunburn
• Sokquon Tran - Wombeyan Caves
• Daniel Walbidi - Kirriwirri, Great Sandy Desert
• Annie Hsiao-Wen Wang - Conversations IV
• Susan J White - On the Hawkesbury
• Philip Wolfhagen - Thirteenth journey
• Joshua Yeldham - Yeoman's Bay, Hawkesbury River (also an Archibald finalist 2013)
• Salvatore Zofrea - Morning light

I'm hoping they will produce the online display of the individual works as they did last year

See my post The Wynne Prize 2012 - Selected artists and winner (which was published a little later than planned)

Frost Fair on the Thames 1683 #1

There are a number of paintings and etchings of Frost Fairs on the River Thames and elsewhere.  This painting is of the celebrated frost fair which occurred in the winter of 1683–84.   Titled Frost Fair on the Thames, with Old London Bridge in the distance, it was painted by an unknown artist in 1685 and is owned by the Yale Centre for British Art.

I've also found an etching of the same scene - also of unknown origin - but it does identify a number of the subjects in the scene.  You can find more versions at The 1683-4 frost fair

Looking at both the painting and engraving makes me wonder why more people don't paint accounts of contemporaneous events today - they're such wonderful records of both time and place!

Frost fair 1683-4

The temperature dropped severely at the beginning of December 1683.  The River Thames froze and remained frozen for nine weeks until early February 1684.   A road developed - called "Temple Street" between Temple Steps on the north bank of the Thames and Southwark on the south bank.  This road is what is portrayed in both painting and etching.  Booths and stalls developed along Temple Street to serve the people passing to and fro across the frozen river - and doubtless sight-seeing too!

John Evelyn, the diarist wrote, 

Coaches plied from Westminster to the Temple, and from several other stairs too and fro, as in the streets; sleds, sliding with skeetes, a bull-baiting, horse and coach races, puppet plays and interludes, cooks, tipling and other lewd places, so that it seemed to be a bacchanalian triumph, or carnival on the water.London: Portrait of a City. Hudson, Roger (1998). The Folio Society. 

Frost Fair on the Thames, with Old London Bridge in the distance (1685)
unknown artist, 17th century, British;
Formerly attributed to Jan Wyck, ca. 1645-1700, Dutch, active in Britain (from about 1664)
Oil on canvas | 25 1/4 x 30 1/4 inches (64.1 x 76.8 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection

I've taken the liberty of lightening the painting slightly - on the basis I don't believe any artist paints a scene of this sort do that it's dark - even if it has darkened with age.  On the Yale website, there is a fascinating set of images of the painting as it used to be and following treatment.

I also found an engraving of the exact same scene on Wikipedia.  I've cropped a large version of it to show more details included by the artist in the foreground.  Below this is the text at the bottom of the picture which tells you about all the things you can see in the engraving - and the painting! It seems very likely that the painting is based on this engraving.

The National Portrait Gallery identifies William Faithorne (1616 – 1691), English painter and engraver as the probably source of the engraving - he had a shop near Temple Bar.

The Thames Frost Fair, 1683
probably by William Faithorne, published by William Warter
line engraving, circa 1684
15 in. x 18 7/8 in. (380 mm x 480 mm) paper size

Crop of foreground of the Engraving of the Frost Fair 1683

The text at the top states

AN

Exact and lively Mapp

or

REPRESENTATION

Of Booths and all the varieties of showes and

Humours upon the ICE on the River of

THAMES by LONDON

During that memorable Frost in the 35th yeare

of the Reigne of his Sacred Maty

King CHARLES the 2d

ANNO Dni MDCLXXXIII.

With an Alphabetical Explanation of the

most remarkeable Figures

The text at the bottom provides an explanation of the alphabetical annotations

The Temple Staires with People goeing upon the Ice to Temple Street A.
The Duke of Yorke's Coffee house B.
The Tory Booth C.
The Booth with a Phoenix on it and Insured as long as the Foundation Stand D.
The Roast Beefe Booth E.
The halfe way house F.
The Beare garden Shire Booth G.
The Musick Booth H.
The Printing Booth I.
The Lottery Booth K.
The Horne Tavern Booth L.
The Temple garden with Crowds of People looking over the wall M.
The Boat drawne with a Hors N.
The Drum Boat O.
the Boat drawne upon wheeles P.
the Bull baiting Q.
The Chair sliding in the Ring R.
The Boyes Sliding S.
The Nine Pinn Playing T.
The sliding on Scates V.
The sledge drawing Coales from the other side of the Thames W.
The Boyes climbing upon the Tree in the Temple garden to see ye Bull Baiting X.
The Toy Shopps Y.
London Bridge Z.
Source for text: visual inspection, and verified from Bentley's Miscellany, Volume 9 by Charles Dickens, William Harrison Ainsworth, Albert Smith; publisher: Richard Bentley; year: 1841; page 133, footnote 1.

In the background is the Old London Bridge which was started in 1176 and completed in 1212.  Over the years properties were built on top of it (see below an etching of it just three years earlier).  The bridge and its buildings survived the great fire of 1666 due to a fire break at the northern end caused by a previous fire.

Drawing of London Bridge from a 1682 London MapSurveyed by: Morgan, William, d. 1690. Published: London, London Topographical Society, 1904

To the south of the Bridge was a gate where the heads of those executed for treason used to be put on spikes - with the head of William Wallace being the first to appear on the gate, in 1305.  This practice stopped in 1660 - just 25 years before this painting.

The church in the background of the frost fair painting is Southwark Cathedral which lies just to the west of London Bridge.  

"October" - Limbourg Brothers (Autumn Landscape #11)

This is another in the series of illuminated paintings in a book of prayers produced by the Limbourg Brothers (1385-1416) for John, Duc de Berry (1340-1416) the third son of King John II of France.  This particular one has familial connections for the Duc.

The book is called the Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry and it's one of the finest examples of French Gothic manuscript illumination surviving to the present day.  It's belonged to various people over the years and is now housed at the Musée Condé in Chantilly, France.).

The very fine miniature paintings of landscapes that it contains represent the direction of landscape painting taken by early Netherlandish painters such as the Limbourg Brothers - who were the first to paint landscapes with accuracy.


Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry Folio 10, verso: October - Sowing the Winter Grain
by the Limbourg brothers [Public domain],via Wikimedia Commons
Date: between 1412 and 1416 and circa 1440
Medium: painting on vellum
Dimensions: Height: 22.5 cm (8.9 in). Width: 13.6 cm (5.4 in).

This is a translation from the French of a description of the scene.

The scene in the foreground represents peasant sowing. At right, a man sows on the fly. Magpies and crows pecking seeds which have been sown, near a white bag and a satchel. Behind a scarecrow-like archer and son stretched on which are hung feathers are intended to deter birds. On the left, a peasant on horseback crosses the harrow on which rests a stone that allows the teeth to penetrate deeper into the earth. It thus covers the grains which have been sown. In the background, the painter has represented the Palais du Louvre. Castle in the center, there are, besides the central tower which housed the royal treasury while the eastern side right, supervised by the Taillerie tower and the tower of the chapel, and left the southern facade with two towers twin center. The whole is surrounded by a wall punctuated by three towers and two bretèches visible here. On the shore, characters converse or walk

It's odd that the description neglects to mention the River Seine!

Interestingly the building in the background is the Louvre Palace.  There are three reasons for the  significance of this miniature painting of the Louvre in an illuminated book of this sort:

• First the idea behind the paintings of different places in the series of different miniature paintings of landscape scenes for the different months was they represented places known to the Duc de Berry.  They were castles he owned or places - like the Louvre Palace - that he had visited.  In this way the book became personal to the man himself.
• Second, the Louvre is the palace built by King Charles V and where he housed his enormous library of 1,200 volumes where books of significance - translated into French - were kept as a symbol in part of this status as King.  
• Third, King Charles V is the Duc de Berry's elder brother and it would therefore appear that the two brothers had a shared love of books.

Thus this painting may represent a visit by the Duc to his brother one October to see that Library.  At the very least, the painting is a compliment to his brother the King in his endeavours to build a library of great books in the Louvre.  (Note: I've just worked all this out reading around the net - I've no idea whether it's true but it makes sense to me!)

That said, this painting still purports to be a painting of the landscape in the middle of Paris in the fifteenth century - with the foreground being the scene on the West Bank.  However. it's unclear whether the Limbourg Brothers ever saw the Louvre Palace

Links:

• The Limbourg Brothers - and "September"
• March: Peasants at Work on a Feudal Estate by Limbourg brothers
• The Louvre, March Mist - Pissaro (Spring Landscape #1)

£25,000 First Prize for Scottish Landscape Painting

Prizewinning landscapes in 2011

On Making A Mark later today, I'll be announcing the details of a major biennial art competition dedicated to painting the Scottish landscape.

The Jolomo Bank of Scotland Awards 2013 for Scottish Landscape Painting are due to be launched at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh later this morning.

Total prize money of £35,000 is available - with £25,000 going to the winner of the First Prize.  A further £10,000 is available to the runners up - so it's a prize which is definitely worth entering by anybody who qualifies.

Before you get to excited, you need to know that the competition is only open to artists who currently living AND working in Scotland

The images on the right are of the paintings which won prizes in 2011

For some background about the prize - see my 2011 post on this blog Scottish Landscape Painting and a £25,000 prize which highlights 24 year old Edinburgh artist Calum McClure who was the 2011 competition winner.  He'd only just graduated from Edinburgh College of Art when he won the prize.

Calum said the impact had been life-changing.

“Winning the Jolomo Award has changed so much about my practice. I have been able to focus entirely on my work, whereas before I was doing 45 hours a week as a chef. It’s a huge opportunity and I feel very privileged to have won.

Along with the monetary side of the award, winning has also given me confidence in my work. The thought that the judging panel had seen something in the localised nature I try to bring to landscape depiction is fulfilling."

How to Enter

Landscape Painting: 2013 Jolomo Bank of Scotland Awards - Call for Entries is my detailed overview of the Call for Entries for the Jolomo Bank of Scotland Awards 2013 for Scottish Landscape Painting - posted on my main blog Making A Mark

Winslow Homer's Studio at Prout Neck

This is a slideshow of photos of Winslow Homer's Studio at Prout Neck in Maine - plus a Vanity fair article on the studio and his painting habits  It would seem Winslow Homer was pretty smart as to the timing of paintings to satisfy the seasonality of people's interests

West Point, Prout's Neck (1910) by Winslow Homer [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

It looks as if tours of the studio where he settled in 1883 are about to start.  This is an extract from the Portland Museum of Art's website relating to The Year of Winslow Homer

Walk in Winslow Homer's footsteps.
The Portland Museum of Art is pleased to offer tours to this National Historic Landmark beginning on September 25.
Reservation details »

In addition, the Museum is having an exhibition Homer's Prouts Neck Home (22 September - 30 December 2012)

To celebrate the opening of the newly renovated Winslow Homer Studio at Prouts Neck, the Portland Museum of Art presents Weatherbeaten: Winslow Homer and Maine. This extraordinary exhibition showcases 38 masterpieces that the great American artist Winslow Homer (1836-1910) created during the final decades of his life, when he lived and worked in Maine.

For more about Winslow Homer see my website - About Winslow Homer - American Artist

BBC4 - Turner's Thames

This week I'm going to focus on JMW Turner's relationship with the Thames and, in particular, the different places where he lived near the Thames.

BBC4 - Turner's Thames

For all those who missed it last night, you can catch up with Turner's Thames on iPlayer - I watched it and recommend it

In this documentary, art critic Matthew Collings explores how Turner makes light the vehicle of feeling in his work, and how he found inspiration in the waters of the river Thames.

It's not going to be repeated and is only available until

The programme is part of the series of BBC programmes about London and the River Thames - and now forms part of the London Collection Archive - A collection of BBC programmes celebrating the people, places and spaces of London.

In this documentary, the presenter and art critic Matthew Collings explores how Turner, the artist of light, makes light the vehicle of feeling in his work, and how he found inspiration for that feeling in the waters of the River Thames. JMW Turner is the most famous of English landscape painters. Throughout a lifetime of travel, he returned time and again to paint and draw scenes of the Thames, the lifeblood of London. This documentary reveals the Thames in all its diverse glory, from its beauty in west London, to its heartland in the City of London and its former docks, out to the vast emptiness and drama of the Thames estuary near Margate.

Turner was among the first to pioneer painting directly from nature, turning a boat into a floating studio from which he sketched the Thames. The river and his unique relationship with it had a powerful impact upon his use of materials, as he sought to find an equivalent in paint for the visual surprise and delight he found in the reality of its waters.

By pursuing this ever-changing tale of light, Turner also documented and reflected upon key moments in British history in the early 19th century; the Napoleonic wars, social unrest and the onset of the industrial revolution. His paintings of the river Thames communicate the fears and exultations of the time. Turner's greatness as a painter is often attributed to his modern use of colour. Many of his paintings are loved by the British public and regularly celebrated as the nation's greatest art. This film reveals for the first time on television a key inspiration for that modernity and celebrity; a stretch of water of immense importance to the nation in the early 19th century but which today is often taken for granted - the River Thames.

Interesting aspects of the programme included:

• Turner lived near to the River Thames or its estuary most of his life - when not off on his travels and the river featured in a lot of his paintings (Tomorrow I'm going to look at the places Turner lived along the River Thames and its estuary - and highlight some of his paintings)
• He returned to the Thames again and again in terms of paintings he created - at a time when London was the most important trading capital city in the world and the Thames was a very important way in which goods were moved
• His methods of notating what he saw, creating a visual framework and language for finding a way to paint the light - and how it varied when seen with water
• His habit of creating a lot of fast sketches of what he saw and then creating watercolour studies while the subject was still fresh - and then the oil paintings back in the studio
• His use of contrast to make a painting more beautiful and the depth of field more effective
• His system for structuring colour and the scope to link colour to human emotion
• His habit of dissolving the landscape in atmospheric swathes of light - his view was that the sun is God

Turner rounded up his students at the Royal Academy and got a boat so that they could all go out into the middle of the Thames and make sketches of the Houses of Parliament burning.  Now there's dedication to your art!

The Burning of the Houses of Parliament
Joseph Mallord William Turner - 1834
watercolour, 23 x 32 cm
Collectiom: British Museum

The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16th October, 1834
J. M. W. Turner [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Link: About J.M.W. Turner - Famous British Painter

Paintings of water in March by Willard Metcalf

I've not come across Willard Metcalf (1858-1925) before.  He's an American artist who became renowned as a landscape painter.  Here are two landscapes by Metcalf for the Spring Landscape series.  They both include water and neatly demonstrate the contrasts in landscape scenes which occur in March in the USA.

The Frozen Pool, March (1909) by Willard Metcalf
66.04 x 73.66 cm

Brook in March (1923) by Willard Metcalf

Facts about Willard Metcalf

• Willard Metcalf studied art at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Académie Julian, Paris.
• Metcalf was the first American painter to visit and paint at Giverny
• He's regarded as a painter within the American Impressionism movement
• He was one of the Ten American Painters who in 1897 seceded from the Society of American Artists - known as "The Ten"
• In 1893 he became a member of the American Watercolor Society, New York.
• He taught at the Art Students League, New York.
• He was involved with the artists' colony at Old Lyme, Connecticut.

The Spring Landscape series will continue next week with paintings of April.  Do send your recommendations to me by leaving a comment on this blog.

Cityscapes - and Terry Miura's Challenge

Terry Miura - Cityscapes

If you're interested in painting cityscapes, I suggest you check out Terry Miura's blog Studio Notes as he's running a challenge.  It's akin to the challenges which Karin Jurick used to run - the provision of a reference photograph and the challenge to produce a painting from it - as the artist sees it.  The difference is that participant's posts are being reproduced - with commentary from the artist - on Terry's own blog.

Cityscapes are hard to paint not only because everything has to be drawn well, but also because there's just an overwhelming amount of information that needs to be processed. Simplification is key, but arbitrary editing of detail can easily end up with a weak painting that lack a sense of intent.

Here are the relevant posts:

• Simplify  - Terry suggests some rules he uses to simplify his cityscapes

One way to approach it is to have rules for editing –and you know by now I like rules. This way, you can do it systematically (more or less) and it helps me to get the painting going in the right direction. Here are some that I use often;

• Decide on a dominant color theme (in this case, blue green) and mix every color as a variation of it. (you want violet? start with blue green and bend it towards violet. Think of it as a violet-er version of the original blue green)

• Paint every element (car, tree, asphalt, etc.) in just two values. Later on you can add a third value to the more important elements.

• Link all similar valued adjacent shapes.

• Have a large passive area. (Forces me to have an area with NO detail, juxtaposed against which the more active areas need less "stuff" in order to look detailed)

• Treat super sharp edges as exclamation points. Don't shout everywhere.

• Simplify! - A Cityscape Challenge - in which Terry sets the basic guidelines for the challenge and how it works
• The Contributions:
• First Contributions Are In! 
• Cityscape Challenge - The Next Batch!
• Simplify! - Some More!

Here's a link to a slideshow of Terry's own cityscapes

Hockney: 51 iPad drawings on paper - Winter to Spring in Woldgate

SkyNews have produced the first video film I've seen which provides a good view of the printed iPad landscapes of East Yorkshire as drawn by David Hockney - which can be seen in the David Hockney RA - The Bigger Picture exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts

The two rows of large "paintings" on three sides of the largest of the Academy’s Galleries (Gallery 3) are 51 iPad drawings printed on paper.  These together with an oil on thirty-two canvases comprise the installation titled ‘The Arrival of Spring on Woldgate, East Yorkshire in 2011 (Twenty-Eleven)’

It's a sequence of paintings from the beginning of January 2011 through to early June 2011 - and shows the movement from the winter landscape through to the spring landscape.



A lot of the iPad drawings are done along the same road which features in a lot of the paintings

Woldgate is a narrow lane that runs from Bessingby Hill on the outskirts of Bridlington to the village of Kilham which is 7 miles away. It was on this road that David Hockney observed many different seasons and recorded what he saw using his iPad and on canvas with paints.
Woldgate

I'm taking my sister to see the exhibition tomorrow - it will be my third visit!  See Making A Mark - Review: David Hockney RA - A Bigger Picture

MIDNIGHT OPENINGS: 'David Hockney RA: A Bigger Picture' is now open until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays

See also:

• Making A Mark: How to produce a large 300dpi TiFF print of an iPad sketch
• Making A Mark Reviews: Product review: A stylus for iPad sketching #1

"February" by Stanley Roy Badmin RWS

At the Watercolours and Works on Paper Art Fair today I saw a painting called "February" by Stanley Roy Badmin RWS (!906 - 1989)

February by Stanley Roy Badmin

I was reminded that his paintings used to be used for the series of Shell maps and the Shell Posters The Key to the Countryside which were produced when I was a child.  We used to have them up in my classroom at primary school.

Stanley Badmin was born in London. He studied at Camberwell College of Arts and at the Royal College of Art from 1924-1928. He taught at various London art schools, including Central School of Arts and Design from 1954. His work was based on the English countryside and the rural way of life, worked mainly in watercolour and pen and ink. His engravings had a distinctive carefully wrought style. Badmin contributed to numerous books, including Trees in Britain, published in 1943 by Puffin Picture Books, periodicals, adverts and posters for London Transport and Shell amongst others.
British Council - Stanley Roy Badmin

It's amazing how one painting takes you right back.  Particularly because I always used to enjoy his illustrations of the countryside.

His painting was very much rooted in the English countryside and his particular area of expertise was portraying all the different species of trees.  He produced the Ladybird Book of Trees, a Puffin book called Trees in Britain and a book called The Shell guide to Trees and Shrubs  - in which this painting illustrated February.

I found a very good version of it online and here are the links to every month - each with a different landscape of trees - enjoy!

• January - Evergreens
• February - Yews and Elms
• March - Poplars, Alders and Willows
• April - Ash, Hornbeam, Horse Chestnut, Cherries
• May - Beech, Field Maple, Sycamore - and more Cherries and Chestnuts
• June - Elms, Hawthorns, Whitebeam and London Plane
• July - Tulip Tree, Catalpa, Tamarisk, Elder and Copper Beech
• August - Willows, Alder and Mulberry
• September - Rowan, Cedar of Lebanon, Gingko
• October - Elder, Oak, Buckthorn, Walnut
• November - Monkey Puzzle, Pines, Cypress
• December - Spruce, Fir, Juniper

I've just ordered a copy of this delightful book from Amazon!

There are some links below which tell you more about this very English watercolour painter of the English landscape.

Links:

• Trees and Mr Badmin on Unmitigated England
• Christies - Stanley Roy Badmin (The Seasons)
• Chris Beetles Gallery - Stanley Roy Badmin
• Stanley Roy Badmin -  Stanley Roy Badmin's Findon Scenes.

David Hockney RA talks about landscape painting

David Hockney RA - A Bigger Picture - Gallery Guide
opening at the Royal Academy of Arts on 21 January 2012

I'm currently writing a review of the new exhibition by David Hockney at the Royal Academy of Arts - David Hockney RA - A Bigger Picture - which I saw today.  It opens to the public on Saturday 21st January.

The exhibition focuses on his recent landscape painting and the majority of the artwork on display in the complete suite of Main Galleries are paintings of the Wolds in East Yorkshire.  This is the area inland from Bridlington where he now lives.

I've rapidly arrived at the conclusion that I need to deal with various specific aspects of the exhibition in posts on this blog - which is what I'll be doing.

This particular post provides an index of opportunities to hear David Hockney talking about his landscape painting and why he's been painting the Easy Yorkshire Wolds in particular for the last few years.

One of the interesting aspects of David Hockney is that he is very articulate and not at all bashful about airing his views on art, painting and anything else he's interested in.

Below you can find links to:

• a ten minute Channel 4 News interview with David Hockney (posted today) in which he talks about the attractions of the East Yorkshire countryside, his use of the iPad for sketching

• HIGHLY RECOMMENDED: Sunday Feature - New Ways of Seeing with David Hockney - an hour long Radio 3 programme  in which Rachel Campbell-Johnston interviews David Hockney at his Bridlington home and his studio ahead of the major exhibition at the Royal Academy.  The link is to where you can access it via iPlayer Catchup. 
• HIGHLY RECOMMENDED: Bruno Wollheim's film (available on DVD) - made over the course of 3 years and first aired on the BBC in 2009 - is one of the best films I've ever seen of the contemporary practice of a painter painting plein air.  There's a lot of film of Hockney painting.  You also get to see how he works with his team of studio assistants.  Read my review of the film when originally shown on the BBC - Review: David Hockney - A Bigger Picture
• Amazon UK - David Hockney: A Bigger Picture
• Amazon.com - David Hockney: A Bigger Picture

The MAM Award for Best Picture (Place) on an Art Blog 2011

Pacific Passage
© Robin Purcell (Robin Purcell - Watercolours in the Plein Air Tradition)
14" x 14", watercolour

I'm pleased to announce that Robin Purcell (Robin Purcell - Watercolours in the Plein Air Tradition) won The Making A Mark Award for Best Picture of a Place - on an Art Blog in 2011.  This prize aims to celebrate and highlight excellence in creating pictures about places in our environment

I nominated her for the award as part of my Annual Making A Mark Awards - and was very pleased to see that she won.  I think her watercolour paintings are fantastic.   Do take a look at her blog post about her Point Lobos series

Also take a look at the other artists who made the short list in VOTE for the Best Artwork on an Art Blog in 2011

Links:

• Nominate the Best Artwork (Place/Landscape) on a blog in 2011
• MAM Awards 2011: Landscape Nominations for Best Artwork

Wolf Kahn - 6 good reasons not to paint a landscape

There's a 2002 Forum Network lecture by Wolf Kahn - highlighting 6 good reasons not to paint a landscape - in which he discusses landscape painting.

Wolf Kahn, an influential modern landscape painter, explains why people become artists, despite the apparent impracticality of art.

Wolf Kahn - 6 good reasons not to paint a landscape

His lecture is organised around the six reasons he puts forward which are:

1. There's no ideology these days to back up landscape painting
2. It's all been done
3. It's far too polite - it ends up in hospital waiting rooms and corporate boardrooms
4. You're mistaken by the public to be a lover of beauty
5. You're mistaken to be an environmentalist
6. There's no politics in landscape painting

There's a link which indicates you can download the audio file of the lecture to listen to as a podcast.

Thanks to Loriann Signori who highlighted this on her blog today.

The lecture is on The Forum Network which is a public media service of WGBH in Boston

So - did you listen to the lecture?  What do you think?

Jackson, New Hampshire - Blogger's Autumn Landscapes #5

Autumn near Jackson, New Hampshire (2006) by Stapleton Kearns
24 by 30 inches

I often read Stapleton Kearns's blog.  He's a professional landscape painter and he has a lot of very sensible things to say.  His blog is always an interesting read.

I spotted this Autumn Landscape on his blog and asked him if I could post it on this blog - and he kindly agreed.

Turning to Winter for a moment, Stapleton is running a first Snowcamp at Sugar Hill in New Hampshire is already full.  He's running two more weekends (28-30 January / 4-6 February) in 2012 - for those who want to have a workshop about painting snow.  It's "set in an old wooden inn on a high ridgetop in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, the views from the property are unbelievable". I hope we get to see what he paints at Snowcamp!

How to get your paintings of Autumn posted on this blog

This is the fifth in my series of Autumn Landscapes by art bloggers.  If you're interested in having your images displayed as part of the seasonal changes

• drop me a line (see side column for email), 
• reference the blog post in which I can see the painting 
• and (this is important) use Readers Autumn Landscapes in the subject line of your email (This is so I can find it in the masses I get each day!)

Places to Paint: Please note that I'm also interested in the place as well as what led you to paint it in Autumn.

I can't promise to display all that I'm told about. Plus there is an absolute rule which is that this is for art bloggers only ie "no blog post, no feature on my blog".

Autumn Landscape by Vincent van Gogh

Autumn Landscape (October/November 1885) 
by Vincent van Gogh
oil on canvas laid down on panel, 67cm x 88cm
Location: Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

I found this painting by Van Gogh interesting for two reasons.

First I'd never ever have guessed it was a painting by Van Gogh.  I'm familiar with his drawings from his time in the Netherlands - see Van Gogh: Drawing Landscapes (Making A Mark 14.2.07) but wouldn't immediately connect the style in those drawings to his painting of these trees

However L'Allée en Automne (Autumn Landscape) is a painting in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge and is attributed to Van Gogh despite the apparent lack of a signature.

Second, the image of the painting in the Museum is much more subdued than the image on Wikipaintings - which is VERY red.  One wonders whether the latter is a copy from a Chinese Art sweatshop or just hyped up in Photoshop to make it look more interesting!  I've subdued this image and reproduced it at the top - but to my mind it still looks too red!

I am persuaded that the painting leans towards brown as, to my mind, all Van Gogh's Dutch paintings seem to lean towards brown.  This was BEFORE he discovered colour and whoever hyped up the wikipaintings version is probably not aware of how truly sombre his Dutch paintings are.  Whether the nature of the colour in his Dutch paintings was an actual colour choice or just a function of the paints he used - which may have lost colour over time - I'm not sure.  I rather suspect it might be a combination of the two.

We certainly all need to be aware that the art we see on the Internet is not necessarily the way the art looks in reality.  Of course, the image on the Fitzwilliam website could just be unnecessarily dull.  If that is indeed the case it certainly wouldn't be the first time I've seen a website image which doesn't look the same as the real thing.  However its colour and tone is much more like other Dutch paintings by Van Gogh that I've seen - and I think this image is much likely to be a true representation of what it actually looks like in reality.

Anybody seen the painting in the Fitzwilliam who knows the answer?

Anybody know why Van Gogh wasn't signing his paintings in 1885?

Are you surprised this is a Van Gogh?

For more about Van Gogh see my posts tagged Van Gogh on Making A Mark or my resource site set up when I was doing my project about his work Vincent van Gogh - Resources for Art Lovers