Giving Back...Donating Art

In a week of trauma like no other in The States, it feels good to be giving back. This morning I am doing a sitting from life and hosting a lunch for the winner of a raffle, 100 per cent of the proceeds going to FOOD Share which feeds the hungry in Ventura County each month.

FOOD Share also have supported my art in a way only angels can. Please donate if you can.

http://www.foodshare.com

I also donated another portrait demo this week to talented young artists, more on that later.

Catch my "Master The Masters" class at CAI this coming Wednesday, if you dare!

Going Dutch
By Johanna Spinks
Oil on panel, 12"x16"
Available at my online store later today.
http://www.johannaspinksfineart.com

Girl With A Pearl Ear-ring

Girl with a Pearl Ear-ing

Oil on linen panel

9"x12"

$500

$5 shipping

Anytime I can paint a girl with a pearl ear-ring I will, in homage to one of my idols Vermeer.

This is my class demo at The California Art Institute yesterday from life model, Zhanna, a favorite of mine. She is not only beautiful, but smart and meditative while posing.

 I want to show some nice clean shapes like the shadow under the nose and perhaps the upper eyelid.

 I want some of the skin to be smooth, but some of it to show brushwork.

I want some areas thick with paint and some sheer like under the neck.

I want some soft edges and some really hard ones.

But most of all I want to paint a girl with a pearl ear-ring as good as Vermeer.

Vermeer - the hottest thing since sliced bread?

My favorite painter Vermeer traded his master pieces for bread just to survive.

I guess he had no time to second guess his art work, never imagining in his wildest croissant dream moment that he would be the hottest thing since sliced bread centuries later, his "Girl With a Pearl Ear-Ring" idolized world-over.

Did he like his paintings when he finished them I wonder? He was a SLOW methodical painter, fastidious in technique, who apparently did very few paintings in his lifetime. Being the bread-winner, got in the way.

Not that I am anything close to a Vermeer, but I promised I would post the' finish' of this painting just off easel, after the earlier 'mushy middle' stage post. I am now in the final stage wondering if a good crusty warm french loaf is in my future.

"SILENT LONGING"

American Stories By Johanna Spinks, copyrighted.

18"x24"

oil on linen, framed

$1,500

Shipping $50

Do I wannabe Vermeer or Asaro?

I had the exquisite pleasure of visiting master artist Mr. John Asaro at his CA studio this week after he read my blog, see previous post http://portraitpaintingbyjohannaspinks.blogspot.com/2009/03/john-asaro.html about his recent mega show in Los Angeles, and called me out of the blue with a lovely invite to come and shoot the art breeze.  www.johnasaro.com

I was desperate to get up to his studio but had to finish a large portrait commission first. It killed me to keep putting him off. But Mr. Asaro graciously waited for me and couldn't have been more sharing of his wisdom the day of the visit or his time. I was in heaven. Just one of those great art days one will never forget. I learned a lot.

Asaro is one of my favorite painters. Morgan Weistling www.morganweistling.com  told me I should study this guy, buy the book. so I did. Like Morgan, Asaro's color, values, and draughtsmanship is superb. Nah, make that unbeatable. Asaro's now out of print book " Asaro: A New Romanticism", is always close by me. What a treat to see some of these images at first hand. Breath-taking color. You just feel that sunshine.

So I came back to my studio and painted this head not only inspired by Asaro's color but also by my other idol Vermeer and his "Red Feather Hat" painting.  I am doing a series of paintings of girls in vintage hats from my collection, all over life size and on the same size canvas.  When I saw this hat it screamed Vermeer and I have been itching to paint it.

Now was the time. I was thinking of what Asaro had told me about color as I got going on my hat set under a cool blue light with cool blue gel. The red was a challenge. My feather hat and skin tone was very garish the end of the first day. Too much fun with color but not in Asaro's capable hands.

The next day I reigned it in a bit looking at how Vermeer used those cool greens and warm oranges in the shadow much like Asaro.  How Vermeer kept the shape of his red hat strong, the value statement of light and shadow bold, much like Asaro.  Vermeer's  ever so subtle color play theory has stood the test of color time.

And, just like Vermeer,  contemporary figurative painter Asaro will go down as one of the greats of our time, of that I am sure.

So do I want to be a Vermeer or Asaro wannabe?  Both are superbly stimulating to me as superior value/colorists but very different in approach.

Heck, I'll just stick to being me but always remember how the greats do it and what I am striving for. The bar is set high.

VERMEER WANNABE?

I had the most extraordinary afternoon yesterday in the company of  Melanie Gifford,  an art  research conservator in the scientific research department at The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Now this is THE rare person on the planet who is allowed to take paint fragments off a 17th Century Vermeer painting and study them under a microscope- along with other master artist paintings deemed necessary to go under her scientific gaze.

But yesterday it was all about the pearl ear-ring  master from the  Delft as Gifford was giving a talk to a packed room, including me, at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena around it's current loan from Washington of Vermeer's painting "A Lady Writing". It is a gem. On view until Feb. 2, 2009 so don't miss it.

When the talk came to an end all too quickly, I had this desire to rush up to her and offer anything, to take here ANYWHERE for dinner, the most expensive restaurant in town if she chose, just so I could keep hearing her talk, in her soothing intelligent tone, about Vermeer. Instead I had to settle for buying yet another Vermeer book, just released,  from the museum store.  A poor second to the conversation I would like to have had with this very clever lady. 

I wonder what happens if a person who has a job like this shows up to work in a bad mood after a lousy Starbuck's or row with the kids in the carpool,  and then doesn't feel like working that day. Does she sling the Vermeer aside for the day and browse on Ebay instead? Or what happens if she had too much wine the night before and  takes too big a chip off a Vermeer? How does one prevent that? And should we really be taking chips off Vermeer under any circumstances? I personally think not although Gifford did say the chip is taken from an area already chipping.

Why do we need to know how he did it to such a degree? The mystery of Vermeer is part of his magic. He was virtually unknown until the mid-1800's. Died in dire straights, almost penniless. Well, the packed room wanted to know every darn detail of how Vermeer did it down to that nerdy Vermeer groupie with unwashed hair in the room (Yes, me) who asked about the possible use of Venetian Turpentine in his medium just because if she knew, then she could paint just like him.  As if it is all in the tools and mediums!

I have read a lot about Vermeer so had heard a lot of it before. Also, Gifford wasn't one to go off on wild tangent speculation being a scientist. And I so wanted her to. When she asked  me what was my 'source" for him using Venetian Turpentine,   I froze.  She was being quite serious. There was no real discussion if I didn't have a source backed up endless research papers.

So for all you wannabes out there, here are a few Vermeer technique-y things from the talk:

Worked on a grey ground

Worked his underpainting up in transparent earth browns over the grey, building up the lights with white

Sometimes used a pinkish ground...hmmmm

Underpainted using coarsely textured paint in parts, especially the darks, for e.g. charcoal black then moving on to a more refined black

Used Linseed Oil. She doubted Venetian Turpentine.

Liked color harmonies, especially yellow/blue. Well, I knew that!

Used warm browns under his paintings of blue cloths for shadow area

Vermillion and green earth used in skin color added to lead white, other colors too

There is another painting underneath Girl in a Red Hat. That's my favorite painting ever (I share this with artist Chuck Close). Don't chip away to find it. Please. Please.

Used small round brushes ( squirrel hair-ish) with soft tips and they were called "pencils" in those days, not brushes

Stiff bristle brushes were a 19th Century invention.

It seems he took his artistic cues from the camera obscura but didn't necessarily slavishly use this optical device. This device was NOT found in his studio when he died. My info..not hers.

Liked small circular brush strokes in his painting of fabrics. 

Composed his paintings from different images. Didn't have the whole image in front of him at one time while painting.

He was very clever and very good. He remains more clever and more good than most to this day. My words, not hers. 

I have decide to channel Vermeer. It is the only way to get the darn answer on that turpentine issue.