Welcome!
The Creative Spirit Blog is a place for sharing creativity, ideas and inspiration. Here you will find plenty of interesting topics posted regularly for both the artist and art enthusiast. Be sure to subscribe to The Creative Spirit Blog to receive notifications of new posts via email.
“All art, literature and music must be brought forth with your heart’s blood.” Edward Munch Teaching is an interesting study of people. Everyone is so different, and how everyone approaches their work is so unique. The attitude you bring…
Read details“Painting isn’t an aesthetic operation; it’s a form of magic designed as a mediator between this strange, hostile world and us, a way of sizing the power by giving form to our terrors as well as our desires” Pablo Picasso “Life happens” on the way…
Read details“When it Rains it Pours.” Morton Salt Company It started when my husband became critically ill…
Read details“The artist does not draw what he sees, but what he must make others see.” Edgar Degas I want to start by saying no good artist ever stops being a student on some level. However, there does come a time when the “art student” should move from the process of learning and practicing techniques to…
Read details“The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things but their inward significance” Aristotle A reader wrote and asked: “How important is composition?” The above quote has sat on the corner of my desk all summer, and I have thought about it often as I have written. Now I want to…
Read details
Composition is the art of arranging in a decorative manner the various elements at the painters disposal for the expression of his feeling” Henri Matisse
“The Principles of Good Design”, are what we try and achieve in all of our artistic work. Value being the most important. It is the play of dark against light that makes a viewer look at a painting. It is what immediately catches the eye. It also is related to the element of color, and therefore it is the principle that helps set the mood or tone of the painting. Then we strive for: harmony of color, rhythm to help us move around the painting, dominance of a shape or color, variety in lines and shapes, balance so one side isn’t heavier than the other, and in the end, total unity. These principles are the same in abstract work as they are in realistic work.
Realistic painters usually use a reference photo unless they are painting out in the field. Learning to edit your photo, or field of vision; to make a strong a composition, knowing what to delete and where to move elements in your reference, is important to the unity of the composition. Gathering photos to work from is an important process. The best photos don’t always make the best pictures. These are some photos I have gathered this week, on vacation, to work from.
Will I need to delete, move, or crop, part of these photos to make an interesting painting? What about the color? Is the color in the photo the same as what I saw when I was facing my subject?
I received an email asking where I teach Pastel. It is at the Artists’ Workshop, Inc., in New Smyrna Beach, FL. We have a “Principle of Good Design in Pastel and Other Realistic Work” class starting on Monday September 26th. If you live in the area and are interested, please contact me at carolynaland@gmail.com .
If you have been following my blog you will know that I believe that the creative process is a very personal. Therefore, I teach composition and techniques, and allow the students to create what they want to express, using subject matter they feel passionate about. Remember…paint what you love.
“Nature is very rarely right, to such an extent even, that it might almost be said that nature is usually wrong; that is to say, the conditions of things that shall bring about the perfection of harmony worthy a picture is rare, and not common at all.” James Whistler
