Itness

Val Nelson on September 9, 2015

Now that the cooler weather of Fall is here, I’m so grateful to be able to get back into the studio and paint paint paint. A little study I made last winter of a scene on my breakfast table has been calling to me. I painted it on an old envelope.

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Val Nelson, V5Y, 4.25 x 6.25 inches, oil on PVA on paper, 2015

The appearance of objects, and their quiet presence or “itness”, has long been something that really gets to me.  I wasn’t sure about this humble image, but after much deliberation I decided there’s something about it I need to pay attention to.

So here’s a painting I made this week:

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Val Nelson, A Room in Mount Pleasant, oil on canvas, 14 x 18 inches, 2015

And I started another one:

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Day One: A Room in Mount Pleasant #2

For the next several months all I want to do is immerse myself in the wordless process of looking,  and recording what I see. I’ve been tussling with a purist notion that I must work only from life; but the practicality of it has not been easy to deal with. The dimensions of my apartment limit me from painting there with an easel; a way around it could have been working very small, but to be honest I get very claustrophobic with all my painting gear cluttering up the place. My home is a sanctuary, where I can rest. So the solution is of course

photography.

This past year of working off and on from life has really helped me. Observing how light changes in a space over time informs how I now see colour, and I realize I have more freedom to mess around with what goes on in the rectangle. At the same time my drawing is getting better.

And my Ipad and Iphone now have those updated apps that have much better options for image correction.

You can see I’ve put grid marks on the canvas above. Having watched Antonio Garcia Lopez paint in the film El Sol del Mebrillo by Victor Erice I realized that within extreme control (measuring), one can then have great freedom (painterly interpretation). But Garcia doesn’t like working from photography. I’m okay with acknowledging I live in the 21st century and can use any technology I want, as did Bonnard, Vuillard, Degas, and those guys who probably used the camera obscura (Vermeer, Caravaggio). However, so far I’m not interested in actually projecting and tracing. I like drawing too much, and I feel like something interesting happens when I get things slightly wrong even though I’m trying to get it right.

 

 

 

 

 

Drawing for Pleasure

Val Nelson on July 24, 2015

Anyone can draw. But people in our culture often think of drawing as something done by children, or a specialist in drawing, called an “artist”. Many times I’ve heard stories from people about an early point in their lives when someone looked at a drawing they had made and said “that doesn’t look real,” or “what’s that supposed to be?” which sadly discouraged them from continuing to draw. They just stopped.

Most of us as children had the compulsion to take crayon to paper or any available surface, out of the sheer joy of making marks, expressing something we saw or imagined or felt.

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Cy Twombly, Untitled (Rome), 1966, Oil, wall paint, grease crayon/canvas, 190 x 200 cm, Sammlung Lambrecht-Schadeberg

Right from the early cave drawings we humans have been recording our experience of the world. What excites me the most about drawing is that when you slow down and really look, the beauty and variety in the world around you begin to reveal themselves. You begin to notice the proportions of buildings, the difference between the ears on a cat compared to those on a dog, the complexity of pattern of wood-grain, or the subtle gradations of light that make up a back-lit glass of water.

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Val Nelson, Dreaming of Picasso, Moleskine sketch book, 2015

On August 9, I will be leading a one-day intensive in my studio, “Drawing Jumpstart.” I encourage anyone, draw-ers and “non-drawers” alike, who have some curiosity and a sense of play to join me. We will have a wonderful day together as we explore the process of recording what we see in various ways.

I also have a few spots available in my “Painting Jumpstart” class on August 23.

For more information about the classes and for registration,  go to the Teaching page on my website.

warmly, Val

Madrid Travel Notes

Val Nelson on June 11, 2015

Ahhh—the meditative experience of train travel, as the landscape floats gently by. After saying goodbye to Barcelona, a few hours later I arrived at the beautiful Atocha Station in Madrid.

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Val Nelson, Atocha Station, 48 x 48 inches, oil on canvas, 2015

I love the in-between spaces of travel, where time is suspended, and human presence, ephemeral.

Taking the handy metro from Atocha, I emerged in the Plaza Tirso de Molina, where I was delighted to find that my new accommodations overlooked this interesting view, great for people-watching.

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Also, I didn’t at all mind the hit of colour in the hot pink bedspread.

DSCF3705madrid-bedroom-morningFirst stop, the main reason for coming to sunny Spain: the magnificent Prado Museum, where I spent most of the day soaking up the fantastic works of Diego de Velázquez. No photography was allowed, but I did make a small drawing of one of his dwarfs, which Velázquez painted around 1645.

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Velasquez made a number of paintings of jesters and dwarves for his patron, King Philip V, to be hung in the royal hunting lodge. Though these characters were employed as a source of amusement and entertainment for the Spanish court, Velasquez captures the intelligence and dignity of his subject, The Jester Don Diego de Acedo, el Primo.

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Las Meninas, Diego Velázquez, 1656, (image courtesy of Wikimedia and Museo del Prado)

I spent several hours in the large room with Velázquez’ masterpiece, Las Meninas, and a number of fabulous Equestrian portraits. Alas, the one of the young prince Carlos was on loan to another museum.

I had previously painted a study of that one from a reproduction in my dog-eared book, Velázquez: The Technique of Genius, so I was looking forward to seeing the painting firsthand, having become so familiar with the master’s work.

But there were still plenty of top-notch painting chops to absorb, such as Goya, El Greco, and Bosch — oh my! But perhaps that is for another blog.

DSCF3196madrid-museum-of-hamOne gets hungry looking at so much art. Luckily on the road across from the Prado, you can visit the very fine Museum of Ham, or “jamón” as they say in Spain.

DSCF3754buenretiroparkgoodAnd behind the Prado is the lovely Buen Retiro Park, where you can eat and drink at little cafés, overlooking a peaceful lake. I returned here several times over the course of my eight days in Madrid, to rest up from the intensity of sight-seeing. There’s nothing like hanging around trees and water to help you recharge.

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A friend from Vancouver put me in touch with her friend Maria who lives in Madrid. Her apartment has a view of the Palacio Real. Maria kindly served me tapas, and invited me back to photograph her lovely apartment in the daytime, as I was charmed by it and saw potential for new paintings.

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Antonio López in his studio in front of his portrait of the Spanish royal family, nearly complete after 20 years. (Photo: Gonzalo Cruz/EP)

I was fortunate to be able to see an exhibition of royal portraits at the Palacio after my photo session. The show included a very good group portrait of the current Spanish royal family by contemporary Spanish painter, Antonio Garcia Lopez. The painting took 20 years to complete because, as the artist says, he was hindered by having to work from photographs.

Lopez, who usually only works from life, is an artist I have been admiring for some time now–there is a wonderful film, El Sol del Membrillo  (Dream of Light) which unfortunately is only available in PAL format, so I have to admit that I sometimes look at a pirated Youtube version in Spanish with no subtitles. This award-winning film by Victor Erice is probably one of the best films I’ve seen on the life of a painter.

I also like to immerse myself in this very good book about Lopez.

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Antonio Garcia Lopez, Gran Vía, August 1, oil on canvas 125x129cm, 2009-2011

Here is another of Lopez’ paintings. Isn’t it fabulous?

DSCF3458view-from-bellas-artes-webAnd here is a spot very close to where he made it. The Edificio Metrópolis building in the left foreground has been vastly improved by the shroud of a celphone ad.

At the Bellas Artes building, you pay a few Euros and take an elevator to the roof, where you’ll get a  panoramic view of Madrid. Madrid’s Academy of Art has its headquarters here, and this is where Dali and Picasso were once students. I now know that there is also an excellent painting gallery there. If you visit Madrid, please go and visit it and tell me what you think.

hasta luego,

Val

 

 

 

 

The Gap between your abilities and your taste

Val Nelson on November 5, 2014

This excellent video by Ira Glass gives inspiring advice to creative people everywhere. It speaks to the fact that, when you’re first starting out on your artistic adventure,  your work will fall short of your expectations. The trick is to MAKE A LOT OF STUFF. Through sheer persistence, and logging in a lot of hours you will get there.

Neil Gaiman: Make Good Art

Val Nelson on June 9, 2012

This seems to be the week of excellent tips from friends on inspiring videos. Interesting that both of the ones I am posting are of fellows from the UK.

Recently writer Neil Gaiman was invited to address the University of the Arts Class of 2012. It’s incredibly inspiring for anyone who needs encouragement to keep on making art. Watch this.

John Cleese on Creativity

Val Nelson on June 9, 2012

An artist friend tipped me about this excellent lecture on YouTube by British comedian John Cleese, on which he succinctly outlines key elements for creativity.

Cleese: “Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating.”

Link to the lecture here

Artist William Kentridge on Charcoal Drawing

Val Nelson on February 11, 2012

The Guardian, Sat 19 Sep 2009
South Africa’s most celebrated contemporary artist describes the allure of working with the messy immediacy of charcoal.
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Interview by Dale Berning
When I went to art school, the idea was that if you were going to be an artist, you had to paint with oil paints on canvas. I discovered I was very bad at that, so it was an enormous relief to discover that there already existed a strong tradition of drawing as a primary medium of art-making.    (read more…)

The Residency Experience

Val Nelson on May 20, 2011

I’ve just completed a residency at the Vermont Studio Center. In Vermont I met some wonderful artists of like minds. We visited each others’ studios, talking late into the evenings while we tussled with the various states of our practices. Some of us were there to make a specific body of work, some were taking the time to start anew. For myself, I was not interested in “production” at this time in my career; I wanted the time to step away from old habits, try some things I had wanted to investigate but hadn’t had time to do because of deadlines and professional commitments of the past eight years.  I wanted to take a big reach outward, even court failure–in fact, I gave my residency a title: Joyful Bungling.  Intense, vigorous, and puzzling, the experience endowed me with some new friends and a re-engagement with my initial compulsion to paint and to draw. This is slowly developing within me as I take time in my own studio back in Vancouver to develop my next body of work.

The American painter Philip Guston, in the newly released book Philip Guston: Collected Writings, Lectures, and Conversations (2011, University of California Press), talks about reaching very far, and then when the work shakes down, it can end up outwardly being only a little more advanced than the last painting you’ve done. We keep circling back.

When I returned to Vancouver, I spent four weeks as artist-in-residence at St George’s School, where I spent time painting in the wonderful Visual Arts Centre there. Some of the boys were at the early stages of learning how to paint and draw, some quite advanced. The energy of the place was contagious, so I obviously needed to respond to that. The final work I made there was this painting of the grade eights in their drawing class.

Learning to Draw, 36 x 48 inches, 2011