Town and Country Farm

8x10 inches
oil on panel
$500.00


Painter's Tip


Time Management in the Studio

One of the biggest problems I see for artists, is good time management. One thing I do is to keep a list of priority "to do's" each week by my computer. I make the list on Sunday night with number 1 being the highest priority, moving down the list from there. I try to be realistic about what can be done, so that I will feel a sense of accomplishment as I check them off.

I also keep a three hole binder on my desk , with all paperwork for each month inside. I keep the current month's calendar taped to the top of the binder and then tear it off at the end of the month replacing it with the next month's calendar. I go through the binder and tear out the papers from the previous month that are no longer useful. Each time paperwork comes in the mail or through the printer, relavant to the current month, it gets punched and put into the binder.

Another organizing tip, is to routinely check your supplies like framing hardware, frames, canvas, paint,shipping supplies etc. so that it is always on hand where it is supposed to be. You never know when you will sell a painting and need to ship immediately.

My last tip is to take care of exhibitions in a timely manner. When the invitation to exhibit comes to you, start preparing right away, with framing, inventory records, paperwork to be sent. I always prepare for my exhibitions immediately and then store the paintings boxed and ready to go with the inventory and required paperwork. When the exhibiton roles around on the calendar, I pickup the paintings and go.

12x16 inches
oil on panel
sold




Collector's Tip



I do a fair number of commissions every year and I like doing them. A commission is a partnership between the collector and the artist. Here are things you should expect from an artist you commission:

You should expect good communication skills.

You should expect to see representative samples of the artist's work.

You should expect to receive work by the deadlines agreed upon, or be advised of any unforeseen situation which will cause delays.

You should expect to be treated courteously and with respect.

You should expect to receive some documentation about the painting you purchase, with archival information, for future restoration if needed.

You should expect the artist to use professional quality paints and supports, to insure longevity of the painting.

You should expect a skill level which is comparable with the cost of the painting.

You should expect an invoice or receipt for the painting.

Most of my collectors are my personal friends. I go the extra mile for them always and do the best I can to please them. They are very important to me as clients and personal friends. They deserve no less than my best efforts.

Old Oak Tree

8x10 inches
oil on panel
$500.00



Painter's Tip

Color Terms
Achromatic--lacking color, neutral; gray, white or black
Basic palette--based on red, yellow, blue or magenta, yellow cyan primaries
Color scheme--a logical relationship of colors on the color wheel
Dominance--having larger color area or brighter color for emphasis
Earth color--low intensity color created from natural earths or synthetic equivalents
Fugitive color--color that fades or changes over a short period of time
Granulation--sedimentary or settling characteristic of pigment
Hue--the name of a color (red, yellow, blue, etc.)
Intensity--purity or brightness of a color; sometimes called chroma or saturation
Juxtapose--place colors side by side for contrast
Key-- high key: light-to-middle values; low key: middle-to-dark values; full contrast: complete value range from light to dark
Local color--actual color of an object
Movement--direction: horizontal (serene), vertical (stable) or diagonal (energetic)
Neutral--gray, white or black
Opacity--covering power of pigment
Primary colors--colors that can't be mixed--red, yellow blue, magenta, cyan
Quality (paint)--characteristic of painted surface--for example, thin, velvety or overworked
Reflected color--colored light that bounces from a surface and falls on a surface nearby
Split Primaries--two of each primary color used to create bright mixtures
Temperature--the warmth or coolness of a color (red-orange is warmest, blue-green is coolest)
Unity--the purpose of design, when everything is working
Value--light to dark range of a color
Wheel--circular arrangement of colors used in color theory and selection
Xpert--what you can be if you explore color
Yellow--the top of the color wheel--(the lightest value and highest intensity color)
Zen of color--your color intuition, which should always be your final authority.

Ormond By The Sea

12x16 inches
oil on panel
$800.00



Painter's Tip



Travel Opportunities

When traveling, be prepared for painting opportunities. Take your camera with you and go off the beaten path. You will see all kinds of potential paintings. Take a sketchbook and a journal with you to record ideas for paintings back in your studio. Be sure to take notes on atmospheric conditions, lighting directions, ambient lighting, color temperature and local color. These sketches and notes, along with a few reference photos will round out your information about a scene, architecture or portrait of a subject you run into on the road. Don't rely on your memory alone.

Blue Lagoon

30x40 inches
oil on canvas
$2300.00




Painter's Tip


Painting Clouds


Clouds are effected by light and perspective just as land objects would be. They will be illuminated on surfaces facing the sun and in variable degrees of shadow elsewhere. The underside often has the darkest value but not always. Clouds will cast shadow on the ground too, especially if the sun is directly overhead.



Exaggerating the contrast between light and shadow will add drama to your painting. I always try to add some land color into the clouds and some sky color into the land so that they are not completely separated.

St Marks Wildlife Refuge

18x24 inches
oil on canvas
$1500.00




Painter's Tip


Are you prepared for your next masterpiece?


Your studio facilitates your art in a major way. Keeping it clean and organized allows you to focus on your work entirely. Here are some things you can do to keep yourself ready for painting.




Keep your brushes clean and stored properly so the ends don't fray. http://www.studioproducts.com makes a wonderful brush soap. You can also use a mild soap like ivory or Murphy's oil soap. Get into the habit of cleaning your brushes regularly.




Keep reference materials organized. I use three ring binders for all of my publicity materials and reference photos. I also keep a binder for my calendar and any papers that are current for each month. It sits on my desk in the studio so I can use it easily.




Keep paint and canvases ordered well in advance to running out. I always take advantage of paint brand sales from catalogue companies. I use a fairly limited palette so I use the same hues regularly. I order them whenever they are on sale even if I don't need them because eventually I will use them. The same with my canvas or boards.




Keep your palette clean in between painting sessions. I use marble tiles for palettes. They are the best I've ever used. They are a warm tan color and the paint mixes beautifully on them. It is wiped off easily with turps. After a few years they can be replaced easily. They are inexpensive too.



Keep all of your supplies on shelving units, organized by product so that they are easy to get to. Try to have different stations for activities so that they stay organized. In my studio, I have a small room dedicated to supplies and my framing equipment. When visitors come, I can slide the door closed. I have another small room for storage of easels and boxes etc. I can close that room to when visitors come. The main studio space can be cleaned and made presentable in about 15 minutes. Always be prepared to receive visitors in a clean and tidy studio. They will be much more impressed by your professionalism. If you do not have extra rooms off the main studio, you can partition off areas with a curtain.


Working in a clean organized space is less stressful and distracting. Plan to do a bit of cleaning at least once a week. Once a year I take a few days to do repainting, and moving around furniture to give it a fresh look.

Indian Pass Marshes

18x24 inches
oil on canvas
$1500.00






Painter's Tip



Choosing The Best Format



The orientation and proportion of your painting should support the composition you choose to paint.



Will it read better as a vertical or horizontal format? Would a square be just right? If you choose a horizontal or vertical format, you must also consider the proportion of the height to width and where the horizon line will be. Consider the view point. Will the viewer be looking up, down, or straight out into the picture plane? When deciding on the horizon line, remember that unequal divisions of space in the painting are more interesting than centered subjects and horizon lines.




Will it be a landscape, seascape or skyscape? What is the dominant area of importance in the painting? What mood are you trying to convey to the viewer? Often horizontal landscapes are more restful and peaceful than vertical.




I do a lot of square paintings. I find them to be very challenging and the compositions can be grand. Good composition is really important in a square format because there is a natural tendency to make everything a portrait and centered in square formats. Off center is more dynamic and interesting.



The next time you pick up a canvas to begin painting, think first about which format may be the best fit for your composition. Don’t just automatically do it the same way you always do it. Consider the possibilities first.

Rabbit Hill Trees

8x10 inches
oil on panel
$500.00


Painter's Tip



Are we making things tougher for our fellow artists?




I can’t think of a much tougher career than being an artist. Let’s face it. We are marketing a product that few can afford or truly appreciate. Not only does the general public feel apathy about the fine arts, but people involved in the industry itself sometimes thwart each other’s progress. Rather than helping each other and celebrating each other’s successes and work, they are busy plotting each other’s downfall.



Artists could go a long way toward improving their lot by not buying into the snobbery and elitism that is so prevalent in the artistic community.



Shame on all of us, every time we say “ Who let him/her into this exhibit? My work is so much better.” How many times have I done that? I shudder to think of how many. What I should be doing is celebrating that artists can be successful, whether I am or not.



It costs us nothing to be generous and kind. When is the last time we offered to help another artist, or went out of our way to say congratulations on a big sale or award?


Do you know an artist who might be down on his luck? How wonderful would it be for an artist to purchase a small painting from an artist who is having financial difficulty? How about buying their lunch or taking them out for coffee? There is much we can do to support each other in the art business. Giving out helpful advice or encouragement is easy and worth a lot to someone who is feeling discouraged.

Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Home

24x24 inches
oil on canvas
$1800.00



Painter's Tip


Bad Paintings



Everyone does a bad painting now and then. I should know after painting for 30 years. I’ve certainly had my share.



Losers are best dealt with before they dry.
For example, if the painting has “gone down the drain”and you know there's no hope, take your palette knife and scrape it off. Take a rag dipped in turps and finish the job. The panel or canvas will have a nice gray tone just perfect for the next painting once it dries.


I use what I call a mud pot to put the left over paint into each time I clean my palette. It eventually all turns gray and is perfect for toning panels and for blocking in underpaintings.


The experience of the bad painting will stay with you. Analyze it when you've had some time away from it and figure out where you went wrong. Learn from it.



In another couple of days, the bad painting will be entirely forgotten, and there'll be no evidence that it ever happened. Except, of course, the fact that your painting skills will have grown stronger because of it.

Rabbit Hill Farm

18x24 inches
oil on canvas
$1500.00




OK,
The pictures seem to be back.




Painter's Tip


Ambient Light


When painting, take into consideration the ambient light on the scene in front of you.

For instance, if you were painting a red car, the light on the roof might appear blue because it is reflecting the light from the sky overhead, so you are dealing with more than the direct sunlight which we all are familiar with. We are dealing with the reflections of ambient light as well.


Light is bouncing all around us on location so we must train ourselves to carefully observe what we see as well as what we think we know. We cannot rely on local color alone to make decisions. Use your observation skills rather than your pre-conceived notions to apply color.



There are color temperature changes within big broad shapes. That is what will make your paintings really become dimensional,if you can get a handle on providing temperature changes within the major shapes. Because of ambient light on surfaces you may have subtle areas of warmth in cool distant trees, and cool areas in closer or immediate areas of the painting.


This will keep your paintings from being too flat. When the values are the same, changes in the temperature can add dimension within the space.

Friends,
I have ruined my blog trying to put in various features. I had to delete my other Landscapes Of The South blog entirely, and now I cannot get images to load on this one. They come out as code instead of images. I am at my wit's end with html.

Until I can find someone to fix this I will continue to post advice for painters. The new address for this blog is www.linda-blondheim.blogspot.com

My apologies for any inconvenience.

Love,
Linda




Painter's Tip



Variation of Intervals



A composition needs variation to be interesting. Try not to make your intervals the same. Vary the heights, depth, planes of elements in compositions. Create interesting groupings in the paintings by using different shapes widths and heights. Creating dynamic balance is a goal. Too much of the same is boring. Too much variation causes your painting to lose continuity. With a variety of elements, the viewers eye moves through the painting, taking longer to see it. The longer the viewer stays in the painting the better.



A focal point is a feature in the painting that draws the viewer in.
It will have any of the following elements:


Contrast in tonal values
Concentration of visual detail and energy
Bright or intense color.
Hard Edges
Gap in patterns
Intersections, curves or diagonals leading into the focal area



You want to provide a trail for the eye to follow through the picture. Lines, leads and pointers from the path of least resistance, naturally attract a viewer's attention. Any linear element in a picture, such as a line or a long narrow shape will create a path for the viewer to follow. In the reverse, these elements can lead the viewer out of the picture as well so be aware of that problem.