Ornamentation Class . Lynne Rutter Studio . San Francisco

Back after a long summer break ...a few pictures of the ornamentation class at Lynne Rutter's studio. I loved that class , Lynne's definitely a marvelous host, the studio is great and this town is profoundly inspiring . Our students were great , they worked intensely and it was a pleasure to teach to them. We had time to cover all the main technical elements but an extra day would have been welcome for the simple pleasure of getting closer to completion ...We used Williamsburg oil paints , gently provided by Golden Paints, thank you Golden !!!

Mural classes at Lynne Rutter Studio

Here is the colored sketch for the first class I will teach at Lynne Rutter Studio this summer.
I had done a pencil study on paper and this week I have painted a color study on canvas.
I have worked from three different pictures I took at Lake Como a couple of years ago ; the door was shot in Provence,
The point is to see a series of technical points relative to landscape painting ( sky, remote hills, village, water), and some other in the foreground ( vegetation, balustrade, bench). The door itself is a nice subject for studying moldings , lights, shadows and various reflections. Linear perspective is also part of this class, for the tracing of the foreground tiles in particular. I hope you will like this.

A one day study / Palm Fine Arts class preparation

I just cannot believe my last post dates back to January ( this year...). I knew I had been busy these last few months but I did not notice so much time flew by.
Anyway, I am happy to be back online , I have a few things to show, here is the first one:

I have a mural class scheduled this summer at Palm Fine Arts.
When I teach this type of course I usually do a full size study of the subject chosen before teaching it.
In order to make sure the content is not too "heavy" I make sure it will not take me more than a day to paint.
My friends Lotta and Mats, owners and teacher at PFA, asked me to propose a landscape with a little bit of a swedish "taste". I made a mix based on a Chichkine ( marvelous russian painter!) landscape and a little background of "my own" and stopped after almost 12 hours , here is the result ( painted with Golden Proceed) :

 1- Drawing and washes in Raw Sienna and Raw Umber.

2- The washes are finished at that stage ; the values of the different areas start to appear.

3- Green tones are applied over the sepia tones ; all is quite transparent. 

4- At this stage I "push" all the dark tones and prepare my background for the "Lights" stage.

4a - detail of the central part.

4b. Dark tones are also applied on the tree trunks. The sky is almost finished ( opaque light blues painted through the foliage).

4c. Detail of the central part.

5. Light greens ( quite opaque) are applied.

5a . At this stage I also block in the flowers on the very foreground.

Stage 5a and final touches on the flowers.

6. Finished panel. I guess that we will add some "living" element in the foreground. There is a bird on Chichkine's model ...I would like to paint a fox in the flowers, at mid-distance.

The whole process is of course much more complex than these short explanations but these are really the steps we will go through when painting this landscape. The focus will be put on the values , on the correct use of paint consistency ( opaque vs. transparent) and on the brushwork. Colors are also key to such subject but the technique ( sepia underground) and the palette we will use will prevent us from getting too green.

Landscape are very interesting to study, quite difficult ( many painters paint good figures but weaker landscape ...one could think that the contrary was true) but with the help of a few technical keys one can really improve.

Summerclass at Palm Fine Arts

Palm Fine Arts is a decorative painting school run by two of the most talented decorative painters, Lotta Olsson and Mats Carlsson. I will post on their work . They have been very kindly invited to me in their summer program for 13 years (!!!).

Here is a presentation of the last class.

Two paintings in a week. This was the program for this years's class at Palm Fine Art.

The plan for the first panel was simply to gently warm up.

Student's work

student's work

I usually start the class with a technical lecture about the "art of painting" , as I see it after years of painting and teaching but this time I decided not to talk too much. Just paint, demonstrate and let people grab what they could instinctively.

Some students almost finished this first painting but most of them just painted the tree and that was  enough to have a good foretaste of the techniques we would use for the rest of the week.

As the students had no time to watch me finish my panel I have provided pictures with short notes like this one.

detail of my panel

The second panel...

... is based on a nice trompe l'oeil I created a few years ago for a show.

It is a very technical one with a lot of different textures ( foliages, grass, stone, textile, wood...etc.), some graphic difficulties ( leaves, chairs...) and a strong focus on contrasts.

That was very ambitious for 4 days and to my surprise most people completed the panel ( or almost). Sometimes the magic happens and even if this takes efforts ( 10 to 12 hours a day) and courage everything works smoothly and we all get the work done.

Here is the piece I painted for my students...

Three days in Antwerpen

Chantal Siebens and Jan Lhermitte are two Salon friends. They have been running a school, Ideefiks, in Antwerpen for many years and last year they invited me for one of their masterclasses.

Belgium is a fabulous country of painters. From Van Eyck and Rubens to Magritte they have given birth to major painters and they also have the strongest tradition of classical european decorative painting ( marbling and graining in particular). I was glad and honored to go there and teach for the first time.

The plan was to organize a short class, I asked them to pick up a "three day" panel their students would like me to teach. They chose the "Vase and Drapery" , a painting I had created a few years ago for a class at the Mural School.


Chantal and Jan live in a typical house they bought years ago and skillfully renovated...

The group of 12 peolple filled up the classroom  but the teacher's spot is big enough to have everyone comfortably installed for the demos.

We began with the landscape in the morning, were finished by the end of the afternoon  and had time to get started on the vase ...

Most of the second day was spent painting the vase and again , by the end of the day we were able to move to the next element : the drapery...

...we have had a perfect weather, the food was very good and the backyard of the school is ideal for outdoor lunches...

Views of the classroom on the third morning...

The traditionnal group picture.

Jan, Pascal, Chantal...

My panel after three days of fun and efforts.

On Sunday morning, before I drove back home  Jan and Chantal took me for a quick tour of the city.

Of course we went to Rubens house ( I guess I will post about it some day).

In the main street of Antwerpen there are statues of Teniers and Van Dyck and  Rubens ...painters are definitely rockstars over there!!