Today's Master Class

Zeke

Today's sculpture studio master class is being conducted by my grandson Zeke. He has a passion for painting and the picture shows him instructing members of his play school on the finer points of brushwork. My daughter says, He paints his heart away and everyone stands around to watch him. It brings joy to my heart, just like his grandad.  

As Pablo Picasso said, It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.

Your hands fashioned and made me...

For my next video I will be returning to the biblical clay. The subject is my model Verlena as she is shown in the opening sketch. The sculpture is really unfinished business, for it is one that we were ready to start work on before she relocated overseas. All I have now is the sketch and some thumbnail photos taken when we were experimenting with this position or that. On the other hand, I have made three sculptures of Verlena, so I know her body by heart.

Incidentally, the clay I am using is the same clay I have used for all my sculptures over the last forty years. In true biblical belief, it has gone from dust to dust time without number. And now, it is once again about to be brought back to life. 

The sculpture will be in relief, rather than in the round. The following blog posts serve as an introduction.

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2020/06/the-beautiful-frontier-between-drawing.html

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2020/06/sculpture-possibilities.html

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2018/05/from-biblical-clay.html

Capturing the figure at a fleeting glance

Click on the image to view the video.

A painting of my wife Denise that I made over thirty years ago, opens my video Capturing the Figure at a Fleeting Glance. 

Of all painting media, watercolour offers the freedom I need to capture the model in all of her moods and changes. When given the freedom it deserves, a watercolour wash has a creative mind of its own. It can run amok or subtly blend. Why then, do most painters deprive watercolour of its most valuable asset.

But beyond the cognoscenti, I doubt that the message "to paint from life" will sink home to the aspirant artists who practice the equivalent of "painting by numbers".

A Work of Art

My well-worn copy purchased circa 1970. Price six shillings.

Although controversial in their day, all of James Joyce's writings are now recognised as classics of 20th century literature. This documentary about the author's life and work was made sixty years ago by Ireland's National Television. By film making standards, it was made on a shoestring, but it is nevertheless a work of art and deserves an Oscar. 

As an 81st Birthday present to myself, I have ordered copies of The Dubliners, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. I hope they are not ceased and burnt by customs on arrival. 

Variations on a Theme

 Variations on a Theme

(Click on the image to view video) 

This video further explores the abstract that lies within my representational figurative paintings. The theme attempts subjects that I dare not contemplate in my youth. As such it represents a new challenge for my octogenarian years. 

The video's sound track features Larry McKenna playing Johnny Mercer's Skylark, the lyrics of which nicely set the mood.

And in your lonely flight

Haven’t you heard the music of the night

Wonderful music

Faint as a will o’ the wisp

Crazy as a loon

Sad as a gypsy serenading the moon…

Revealing the abstract

 A Different Way of Seeing

(Click on the image to view video) 

Fifty-five years ago, as an aspiring artist, I exhibited my paintings on the pavements of France, straight from the pages of my sketchbook. There was no aloof gallery attendant between artist and buyer.  My sketches were framed by falling leaves and lit by sunlight and shadow. When exhibited as pictures on walls, they are detached from their poetic origins.

Many years ago, I began experimenting with viewing paintings beyond the limitations of size and venue. I projected them as colour slides to the size of a house wall. More recently, video editing programs have enabled me to zoom into details and pan over the image. I have found paintings within a painting and details that border on the abstract.

The looser the painting, the greater is its potential for transformation. For this to happen, the freedom of my watercolours and pastels is an enabling factor. I found a rich source of material in the hundreds of paintings that over the years I have cast aside as perceived failures. When viewing these paintings larger than life, I found inspirational passages that begged to be retrieved.

Fishing boats, crowds at the carnival and the English countryside were a rich source of paintings within a painting. And the more creative and less defined the painting, the greater its abstract content, as proved to be the case in a still life and the riotous colours found in a single spray of flowers.

For my experiments the subject of the painting was incidental and my video invites you to experience a different way of seeing.  

Revealing the abstract 

Bear with me

Detail from the 16" x 20" pastel drawing shown in the insert.

In the first instance, I ask you to bear with me. In other words, be patient while I continue my experiments of focusing on the abstract potential of details. When I finally get the concept together, you can then bare with me. In other words, join me in viewing the beauty that is revealed.

Although the drawing as a whole is stilted, the detail is relaxed.

Revelations

The revelation of seeing a minute detail enlarge to the size of house wall.

The dictionary definition of "revelation" nicely sums up what I am after: A Pleasant and enlightening surprise. The surprise first came about ten years ago when I began searching for a new way of presenting my work, in the belief that there has to be more to exhibiting paintings than static framed pictures on walls.

I began experimenting by projecting onto an eight foot screen a one inch detail of a watercolour. The result was a pleasant and enlightening surprise. With video I can now go a step further and make the image move - just a the lines and washes that I throw down on paper move when the work is in progress. 

As I have indicated in numerous past posts: the devil is in the detail!

Portraits with a difference

The last in my series of Painting from Life videos is on the subject of portraits, but portraits with a difference. The difference being working freely from the live model as against minutely copying from a photograph. The video ends with a four minute demonstration of me painting my self-portrait - warts and all. 

As my portraits do not look "just like a photograph", I doubt that the content will go down well with the majority of aspiring artists. But that's me!

I am now working on a series of experimental videos, not so much to tutor, but to inspire. 

Innovation and Creativity

Bevin Etienne is a professor at the McIntire School of Commerce at the University of Virginia. He is from my island of dominica, and is an expert in the areas of sustainability, entrepreneurship, energy and social innovation.  

Dr. Etienne is currently visiting Dominica with fifteen of his students who are focusing on Social Entrepreneurship in Small Island Developing States. The theme of their visit to my workshops and studio was innovation and creativity - and that I have in abundance!

All that Jass

 

The crowd at last year's Jazz 'n Creole

As a jazz devotee I have for years been concerned about the content of Dominica's annual Jazz 'n Creole. In the past I suggest that it be re-named, “Dominica Popular Music Festival + All Else”. 

But Dominica's Prime Minister went one better. In commenting on this year’s Jazz ‘n Creole, by accident or intent, he put the event in context when he said, I think that it has been a good Jazz. Had the word “jazz” been spelt “jass”, we could assume that he was not referring to the music but to the revellers having a jump up. 

The word jazz, in reference to the music as an art form, did not come into use until 1917. Before that it was jass.In those early days, jass was good time music in dance halls. The word being possibly derived from "jasmine", a strong perfume popular with prostitutes in the red-light district of New Orleans.

Promoting the event for what it really is would draw even bigger crowds. With a separate event devoted to jazz and its creole influence we could then begin to foster an appreciation for one of the world’s most profound art forms, and moreover, an understanding in young Dominicans that this art form was created by those of African and Creole descent. Such an event may not initially draw the crowds but it would in time appeal to the cognoscenti, as the success of real jazz festivals throughout the world have shown.

Video footage of the event left me wishing I could have been there - not to listen to the music but to sketch the crowds. 

How I wish!

Landscapes with Figures

An image from my video Landscapes with Figures

 

My most recent video delves into the challenge of adding figures to landscapes. If done spontaneously, they fall into place as natural as breath; if they are laboured over they become obtrusive.

Although my sketches are the work of seconds, I have laboured for weeks to get the message across in a video. My demonstration ends with a statement from an onlooker: He's made a mess of that!

Inheritance

 

Zeke

My daughter Trina lives in the UK and her two year old son Zeke, has recently started attending pre-school. A couple of weeks ago the school expressed concern about his speech, or rather his inability to speak. I told my daughter not to worry. 

I didn't start talking until I was five. (My brother says I've made up for it since!) I couldn't even pronounce my own name. The closest I could get to Roger was "Ory", and until their dying day my parents always referred to me as "our Ory". Perhaps, like me, he's dyslexic. If so, we have another creative person in the family.

Trina took my advice, and instead of worrying bought him a box of paints and sat him down in front of my latest video. The paints and video held him spellbound. But that isn't all. Yesterday, when she collected him from school, the teachers told her of a strange happening. At playtime, when the other children in his group played on bikes, slides and swings, he saw some of the older children painting. He promptly went over to them, picked up a pad and paint box, and very contentedly sat down in the playground and started to paint. My daughter was overjoyed. Just like his grandfather, he had found his individual place in life. 

But that isn't all. A similar story recently repeated itself in the British Virgin Islands. My son Karl is an accomplished potter. After watching my video "Releasing Your Creative Potential" his ten year old son Kem, came up with the drawing below.

If the current work of Zeke and Kem is anything to go buy, I can rest assured that my creative genes have been inherited by my grandchildren.

The secret contents of my sketch bag

Click on the image to view the secret contents of my sketch bag.

I am forever being asked about the materials I use as a watercolourist. To put the matter to rest, my latest video reveals the secret contents of my sketch bag. In amongst what you'd expect to find, there are two essential items that you would never have guessed. 

The revelation came about by way of demonstrating my way of painting landscapes; not from a sterile photograph, but from life. 

If you click on the opening image, all will be revealed - from a five dollar bill to a bottle of 1001 Carpet Cleaner.

 

Exposing the Upper Extremities

Denise

The opening painting is of my wife Denise. The photo below is of eleven year old Zendaya Robinson, who to her credit - and that of her parents - is a young author featured in a book titled, Stories by Children.

Zendaya Robinson

The title of this post comes from a comment to the news feature that highlighted Zendaya's accomplishment. It reads: 

That  how parents are dressing their little girls? Just as grownups. No good examples whatsoever. What a shame to dress a little child with bare upper extremities. 

In polite sexual terms, "Bare Upper Extremities" ranks with "Private Parts".

The painting of my wife and the photo of Zendaya speak of innocence. Both relate to dress code and the Christian horror of nakedness. Cultural dress in the Caribbean labours under the same misconceptions, as illustrated below.

The result of a competition for the design of a 

Cultural Dress for the British Virgin Islands. 

(front view left, back view right) 

This again brought its share of readers comments to the associated news item. I added to the debate as to the appropriateness of the design:

Curiously, I have found that nowhere in the Caribbean, does the traditional/cultural dress reflect the African roots of the people. For the most part it reflects the dress of their past colonial masters. Culture isn't something that can be made up. It's not a promotional product. If it's not entrenched in the belly of the people, it counts for naught.

Readers responded as follows:

What you say is partly true, but Africa has thousands of different cultures, which are hugely varied, so unless all BVI Islanders can trace their roots back to one village, then it’s laughable to focus on one culture from that continent and copy it over to the BVI.

We should leave Africa out of this, we are Caribbean people, mix every which way and that. The current national wear reflects the Caribbean, which is suited to all who live here.

When my granny used to walk with basket on her head she didn't dress like that.

Perhaps it's time for me to reopen the portfolio of my Bare Minimum fashion designs.

A Radical Rethink

 Roseau, the capital of Dominica, as seen from outer space.

The comments in response to a recent news item, “City Facelift to Begin Later This Year” were in agreement that something needs to be done, but they questioned, what should be done and how it should be done. The only thing we know for certain is that the answer to the problem will not be found in a computer-generated preview of Great George Street shown below.  

More to real life is the sketch I made of the same street, and from the same vantage point, thirty-five years ago.

 

Townscapes are my passion, both planning them and sketching them, and my commentary to the news item reads as follows.

 

Noisy, dirty, smelly, sweltering, congested, nowhere to safely walk and nowhere to park!

These are the impressions that Roseau imparts in the minds of residents and visitors. The grandiose title of city – which under British rule may have been earned by virtue of its diocesan cathedral – is misleading. In reality, Roseau is a market town, the layout of which has not significantly changed since the 19th century. Its streets and narrow lanes were laid out for horse and handcarts, not motorcars. If fever had not ravaged Portsmouth in earlier times, Roseau would not have become the capital of Dominica. Valid reasons can now be made for the capital to revert back to Portsmouth, but until that day arrives, we need to radically rethink Roseau.

Over the last fifty years, Roseau has degenerated into being a blot on the landscape and without a visionary all-embracing master plan, no amount of piecemeal enhancement will halt the decline.  

May I suggest, that before the US$41 Million loan from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia burns a hole in our pockets, we should bear in mind that the key operative clause in the brief for the UK’s most ambitious regeneration projects reads: VISION LED, NOT FUNDING FED!

The vision for Roseau cannot be conceived on an architect’s drawing board in Barbados or at an office desk in Dubai. Vernacular comes from within, not from without. A town plan that may be fitting for elsewhere in the world, is not necessarily fitting for Dominica.

To restructure a town, and yet preserve what remains of its identity, is an art form in itself. Coincidentally, the man who wrote the definitive book on the subject began his working life as a town planner in the Caribbean. The book, The Concise Townscape by Gordon Cullen, should be required reading by all involved in this initiative.

Out of all the historic town regeneration projects that I have been involved with, Roseau presents the greatest challenge. The elements of Roseau’s townscape are confused and conflicting. I cannot accept Discover Dominica’s vision of “a quaint town that has a picturesque array of 18th-century French architecture”. That image might have been true when I first knew the town fifty years ago, but not now. A glance at the satellite image of Roseau illustrates what we are up against.

Widening the streets will not solve Roseau’s traffic problem, but making the town pedestrian friendly could. The town has the advantage of being located on flat land; there are no steep hills to climb and it only takes five minutes to walk from one end of town to the other. In terms of shade, the narrower the streets the better. Without the hazard of broken pavements and open drains, walking would be a pleasure. Shops and restaurants would benefit by being able to open up their frontage, as is done in many countries with a favourable climate.

With a radical rearrangement of what goes where, ample provision for parking can be created around the perimeter of the town centre. Large cities overcome their parking problems by “park and ride” initiatives, whereas our small scale offers the better alternative of “park and walk”. Through traffic should not pass through the town centre, nor should it pass along the Bay Front or by way of the Botanic Gardens. There is an alternative route staring us in the face, but no one has tumbled to it.

We urgently need an up-to-date comprehensive development plan. Such a plan would protect buildings of historical worth, encourage regeneration and guard against the piecemeal development that is blighting the townscape. In 2005 Baptiste & Associates Ltd., a local company, produced a 383-page development plan. But a lot has happened since the plan was first drafted.

In remaking the old town, we need to solicit the understanding of the public at large and engage them in the planning process.  We need to facilitate dialogue and to open up the creative processes, so as to bring together contributors from a diverse spectrum of backgrounds. This cannot be done solely by way of architect’s drawings and artist’s impressions. For the aforementioned UK regeneration project I initiated town walkabouts, held countless community meetings, made interactive models, took thousands of photographs and hours of video footage. 

 

Specialization hampers creative solutions. Innovation requires diverse experience and knowledge. It is achieved by questioning everything that has gone before and at the same time, utilizing what has gone before. It can sometimes be achieved by putting two diverse thoughts together. On the UK regeneration initiative, the solution to a major traffic problem came, not from the town planner with a Master’s Degree, but from a housewife standing next to me in the queue at the Post Office.

One of the benefits of creating a new town out of the old, could be the revival of skills. Technicalities alone will not produce a townscape that is pleasing to the eye and fit for its purpose. And a college degree will not necessarily solve the problem. Up to a hundred years ago, it was the master craftsman that determined good design and from his workbench beauty and function unselfconsciously equated. An adherence to those skills, together with a respect for the vernacular, will guard against the town becoming a Disney Theme Park. 

 

Unless a far reaching and innovative development plan is formulated and implemented, Roseau will sink further into urban decay. And remember, the identity of places reflects the identity of ourselves. Roseau is a small town on a small island. It is not a second Dubai. 

Practicing to be a painter

The Hen House

The next video in my series Notes for Art Students will focus on my past work as a painter of landscapes. I say past work, because for the last thirty-five years, it has been the figure that has commanded my attention. But today, as a means of keeping the series up to date, I went out, and painting a picture of my wife's hen house. 

In my early days as a painter of landscapes, an onlooker asked, if I was practicing to be a painter. If asked the same question today, I would confess that I am still practicing. No matter what the art form, as artist never stops practicing.

The reason for my choice of what might be perceived as a mundane subject, is to drum home to art students and aspiring artists that anything is painters' fodder. It's better to make a lot out of a common and garden little, than to make a little out of an idyllic lot. 

Links to all my videos can be found on my YouTube Channel Homepage. 

Notes for Art Students, Part Two

Click on image to view.

Hot on the heels of my last post is Part Two in my series Notes for Art Students. 

My climb up the documentary video steep learning curve continues. As with climbing a mountain, just when you think you're nearing the top, another steep slope awaits. With my son helping me along, we spent yesterday working on sound quality; partly due to recording technicalities, which he can put right, and partly due to my dyslexic miss pronunciations and hesitancies, which the more we try, the worse they get.

The introduction to each video begins with relevant autobiographical images. My painting demonstrations are in real time, which means I'm eligible for the Guiness Book of Records in terms of speed of execution. Where others take an hour, I take five minutes.

I welcome your feedback on the series.

The ugliness of beautification

 

Municipal Rustic. An illustration from Ian Nairn's book Outrage.

In the realms of the urban environment, “beautification” is not creating beauty, but cleaning up the mess that disfigured that which was beautiful before we made a mess of it.

Ian Nairn highlighted the problem in his book "Outrage". That was seventy years ago, and in the meantime the roots of beautification have multiplied and termites have eaten their way through my cherished copy his book. 

Rural beautification is even worse. On my island the verges of a road that passes through the rain forest have been beautified with crotons.

Focusing the eye towards telling detail.

 

The opening pictures illustrate what the moving image can do best; that is, zooming out from a detail to the picture as a whole. This is what the eye does when viewing a picture. But by way of the camera, I have the advantage of selecting the viewer's starting point. When left to their own devices, viewers invariably begin by convertly focusing on the body parts that are deemed forbidden. 

I only wish that I could free my videos from the excessively wide horizontal format of today's screens - be it the cinema, television or handheld device. Paintings in the wide horizontal are a rarity. The format of my reclining nudes is only moderately horizontal, whereas my standing figures demand the vertical.

My most recent video is seen as source of inspiration to art students and aspiring artists who had almost given up. 

Realising Creative Potential

 

Click on the image to view.

 

The first video, in my series of Notes for Art Students, is titled Realising Creative Potential. The content is relevant, as we are all born with 98% the creative potential of genius, but by the time we reach adulthood, conformity has reduced it to less than 2%. 

The video is supplemented by my books on the same theme. 

My collection of videos on art can be found at my Video Channel Home Page.

Sound, vision and the written word

Today's image is the header of a blog that has had just two brief spurts of life over the last ten years. I am now in the process of resurrecting the notes with sound, vision and the written word: that being a series of art tutorials videos together with a book on the same subject.

It will serve as an antidote for those who have suffered an overdose of insipid tutorial art videos. My intention is to put the passion back into art. So be warned, viewing and reading will not be for the faint hearted. I can already hear the scratching of censorous pens.

By getting the message across by different means, I may find, as J B Priestley found of his wartime broadcasts:

I have been hard at it getting through to the public mind, one way or another, for about twenty years, but as a medium of communication broadcasting makes everything seem like the method of a secret society.

If the author found that to be true of a five minute talk on the radio over 80 years ago, I wonder what he'd make of today's social media.

Injecting life into a still life

Still life by the 17th century Flemish painter Artus Claessens.

Still life by Paul Cezanne (1839-1906)

The video that I am now working on is about injecting life into still life. But whether it be a still life, landscape or figure, encouraging the majority of artists that post on facebook forums to inject life into their paintings is like trying to resurrect the dead. It is slavishly copying from photographs that puts the nail in the coffin.

Working from life is a messy business and the result is not likely to win accolades to the tune of "how sweet". In my real life life-classes, erasing is forbidden. In my book Notes on the Nude I have this to say:

I only enforce one rule for those attending my life class: no erasers! In sketching, as in life, every moment counts, mistakes and all. There’s no turning the clock back. One of my mature students put it nicely when she told the class she had earned every line on her face. Hidden in a confusion of wrong lines is the right line. When I find it, I firm it up and the wrong lines remain to emphasise that I have figured it out. Sometimes I leave the viewer to determine which line is the right line. By these means I invite the viewer to have a say in the creative process. A multitude of lines gives testimony to the struggle one faces when working from the live model.  The model is alive, and the artist must somehow put the very breath of life down on paper.  Right lines and wrong lines all count: there’s no rubbing out.

A passion that never dies.

Click on the image to view.

My latest video traces work in progress on sculptures in my series Daughters of the Caribbean Sun. It is the story of a love affair began over fifty years ago when I was seduced by Enzo Plazzotta's sculpture Jamaican Girl and it continues to this day.

 

Your clothes conceal much of your beauty...

 In his book The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran has this to say about clothes:

And the weaver said, Speak to us of Clothes.

     And he answered:

     Your clothes conceal much of your beauty,

yet they hide not the unbeautiful.

     And though you seek in garments the

freedom of privacy you may find in them

a harness and a chain.

     Would that you could meet the sun

and the wind with more of your skin and less

of your raiment,

     For the breath of life is in the sunlight

and the hand of life is in the wind.

 

     Some of you say, “It is the north wind

who has woven the clothes we wear.”

     And I say, Ay, it was the north wind,

     But shame was his loom, and the soften-

ing of the sinews was his thread.

     And when his work was done he laughed

in the forest.

     Forget not that modesty is for a shield

against the eye of the unclean.

     And when the unclean shall be no more,

what were modesty but a fetter and a fouling

of the mind?

     And forget not that the earth delights to

feel your bare feet and the winds long to

play with your hair.

The quandary of depicting the nude.

Three years ago I opened my post tilted As a matter of Fact with the following health warning:

The images that follow have been recently banned by Social Media's Keeper's of Public Decency. 

The censor's message reads: This post was flagged because it contains adult content which violates our Community Guidelines. THIS DECISION CANNOT BE APPEALED. It appears that social media in general wants us to be more comfortable with war, violence and foul language than with innocent paintings of the nude.

I trust that Edouard Danton's paintings will not shock or offend followers of this blog. 

The video I am now working on delves into the issue of depicting the nude with reference to the live model. In all of the instructional videos that I've seen on working from the nude model, the camera acts as a fig leaf and discreetly masks what you should not see. And that's far removed from life. I feel compelled to do otherwise and risk censorship.

I take courage in the fact that my recent released video Working from Life has won praise from the cognoscenti.

My Father's Studio Edouard Danton (1848-1897)

 

The painter Edouard Danton (1848-1897) came from a family of sculptors and the paintings he made in his father's studio to my mind perfectly capture the matter of fact business of working from the nude model. I stress "to my mind" because one critic from the world of art academia - having I'm sure, never worked from the nude - considers his paintings mere titillation. 

In my book Notes on the Nude I delve deeper into the working relationship between artist and model. In particular the titillation of the provocatively dressed model as against the natural beauty of the undressed:

The human body is less sexually alluring nude than when it is dressed. If one of my regular models had posed in the fetching flimsy white dress she wore on arrival, I would have been lost beyond recall. But as soon as she took it off we were back to our matter of fact working relationship.

As with the model depicted in the painting, my models are likewise fascinated by the work in progress and at the end of a session I can sense my model's reluctance to exchange the freedom of the nude for the restrictions of being clothed.

Below are two more of Edouard Danton's masterly paintings. As a sculptor I can recognise every detail, from the tools on his workbench, to the temporary rail alongside the modelling stand, and the calm composure of the model.

Casting from Life

Coin d atelier

 

Artist and Model

This demonstration video supplements my book Notes on the Nude. I hope it encourage a new generation of artists to pursue the challenge of working from the nude model and inspire a new generation of models. In recent times artists have resorted to working from photographs, rather than from life. 

To quote from my book:

I cannot walk around a photograph of my subject, neither can I touch, feel, sense or talk to it.  It can be troublesome working outdoors; you get burnt by the sun, drenched by the rain, bitten by ants and easels get bowled over in the wind.  In the studio, models cannot be expected to retain the freshness of a pose for longer than a couple of minutes. Nevertheless, the rewards of working from life are worth the effort.  Between the torn up false starts, the exploratory lines and the dashed down runs of colour, there on paper, is a trace of the truth! 

You can view the video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFBxxmBNsDU