Updates from Terri on Her Art Journey
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One of my goals for this Spring was to start teaching acrylic painting to absolute beginners. I even had a classroom booked at the local art gallery for a class I planned to teach on April 17.
Alas, my plans were disrupted about five weeks ago when I tripped, fell and fractured my left elbow. The surgery went well and my arm is already out of the cast, but my surgeon wants me to wear a sling when I’m out of the house and he’s forbidden me to drive or lift anything heavy. And while I’m healing nicely and I’m well on the road to recovery, my left hand is still weak, unable to open a tube of paint. So, I’ve canceled the April 17 class, hoping to reschedule it if and when a classroom at the gallery is available later this Spring or Summer. But this little setback hasn’t stopped me in my tracks! As I’ve discovered, I can teach at my kitchen table. Although it’s not a classroom of students, I can give one-on-one private lessons. I gave my second lesson on Friday. The first two lessons have been about the fundamentals of painting, starting with the color wheel and explaining how the three primary colors (blue, red and yellow) can be mixed to make all the other colors. For landscape painting, we will use ultramarine blue, alizarin crimson and yellow ochre; we made a color chart using this palette. We also discussed the importance of values (the range of darks and lights) and how to make a chromatic dark as part of a values study. Basically, the use of values is how you make a two-dimensional surface appear to be three dimensional, and it’s probably more important than color. Indeed, a popular critique of artists is “Color gets the credit, but values do the work.” Finally, I gave a simple demonstration of composition and design, starting with the “rule of thirds,” which suggests that the horizon line of a landscape is best located at either the top third or bottom third of a painting (and never directly in the middle). Furthermore, the main subject of a painting or focal point (the area of the painting that draws the eye) should be placed at one of the four areas where the one-third lines intersect (see diagram). I’m personally benefiting from these private lessons about the fundamentals of painting. They’ve been a refresher course, and I’m sure they’ll make me a better teacher when I get back to the gallery and offer courses to a larger student body. So in retrospect, I’m almost grateful for my little injury. Your art journey, like mine, might have its fair share of challenges and struggles. But if we have faith and persevere, we emerge stronger and more resilient than we ever thought possible. After all, we know that with God, anything is possible.
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AuthorTerri Thompson is a journalist-turned-visual artist, who is on an "art journey" and exploring how to tell her stories through her watercolor and acrylic paintings and photographs. Categories |