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Loosening up
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Posted
I’ve found the comments relating to this topic totally predictable and exactly what I would expect to hear from a mixed section of the community.
We all have different ideas regarding the concept of art, it’s as simple and straightforward as that - nothing new here, but it is good to see a bit of life injected into the forum!
Posted
I don't think this discussion has had the first thing to do with 'loose' as opposed to 'realism', or whatever it was supposed to be compared to, because the initial concept as represented by those two paintings didn't represent either. (I mean no disrespect to those who contributed - it's just that I don't think the initial comparison was especially apt.) The first painting was produced to a formula - first you put your mountain in, then a bit of mist, then find a colour to make it a bit more 'interesting', though Lord alone knows where it was supposed to come from, then you paint the trees like this - i.e. as no actual tree has ever looked - then you paint the water like this, then you take your painting knife and put a few wind lines in the water, and there you are: Bob Ross is your uncle.
And you end up with the sort of painting you might put in an otherwise empty corridor in a suburban hotel.
But there's nothing realistic about it - or representational - or figurative - it's just a bad painting, churned out to a rigid recipe.
The second one - doesn't matter if you like it or not: it's too small for me to have formed much of an opinion about that - I struggle to see the brush-marks - is not painted to a formula, and doesn't therefore come across as an unappetizing bowl of carefully mixed baby slop. That's the difference between the paintings, not whether one is loose and the other tight - that doesn't even begin to be the difference between them. I'm quite happy to attack modern art experts, and old art experts too, to question their expertise, their judgements, their critiques, their right to criticize in the first place. I'm a bit less keen on entering the debate about the respective virtues or otherwise of loose painting as opposed to detailed work, because - I don't honestly think it matters very much.
But - Bob Ross was, on the whole, just a stink-awful painter who had no idea how to mix colours, didn't understand tonal relationships (or perspective... of colour or anything else), was doubtless a lovely man with a sadly shortened life, etc, but doesn't belong in any discussion about any painting issue you'd care to mention. If you like his paintings, good luck to you - some people like watching Mrs Brown's Boys: probably as an escape from quotidian reality - or a respite from having to think. But the comparison here just doesn't work at all in the way the writer intended - a better selection of works might.
Posted
This thread was headed ‘Loosening up’, so I’ll relate it to my own view on painting.
If I’m looking for a looser approach to my work, one of the best ways for me is to paint plein air! I’m interested in capturing the atmosphere of the scene, rather than a tedious and accurate study. My camera does a much better job of doing that!
The weather, time restraints due to lightning conditions etc, all make for a more spontaneous and usually more exciting painting. There’s no time for fiddling around and so on. This is always my preferred way of working but I understand that it’s not for everyone for a whole host of reasons.
Bob Ross never painted outdoors, probably one of the reasons his work is flat, sterile, repetitive and frankly unrealistic in every way. His followers, and there are a lot, continue in his footsteps, they have little hope of improving and have no desire to.
Posted
Well, well, well. The last time I looked here this post had no responses; there are now three pages.
Lewis. I think perhaps you misunderstand my tutor’s can’t see it remark. It was used in the context of learning observational drawing—most usually a life drawing session; draw what you see not what you know; it has little or nothing to do with imagination.
Michael. Your scales analogy is a little lost on me I’m afraid. Are the pans level to begin with? What is the weighting that tips the pans? Is it a duck? Does that mean that abstract art is a witch? (My tongue is in my Pythonesque cheek now).
I wouldn’t disagree that there are degrees of looseness. My remark I’m presenting the tight/loose gradation as if there were a clear boundary between the two was meant to indicate the artificiality of the boundary I had, for convenience, suggested.
I picked the two images with some care and thought although of course there are many others I could have used. The Bob Ross work I picked as an example of the “How to paint a…” videos that YouTube is littered with. I should just ignore them but they irritate me. Assuming that one could reproduce that or any other with 100% accuracy, what would that teach you? It would teach you how to paint a… I think that a great deal (more than half probably, although I have no idea how it might be measured (Michael’s scales maybe?)) of the impact a painting or drawing has could be attributed to the ‘why?’ rather than the ‘how?’
Jim. Turner not Constable. Exactly. It’s not a question of which is better. The Turner-esque attempts to capture a fleeting moment (perhaps) just like a camera but with so much more than the camera can ever do. And there are also photographs that capture a moment in ways that a painting can never do.
Alan/Robert. The first is Bob Ross. The second is Louise Balaam. Furthermore it’s my bet that the LB work took longer (if that is a measure of anything at all) and certainly far more struggle and effort—it’s very carefully and thoughtfully observed and worked, and at the same time does not dismiss the accidental. The Bob Ross is a demonstration of nothing but technique which is why I find such works to be shallow and insubstantial—Sylvia and me are pushing each other out of the way to get to the good stuff.
Robert W. Re your Turner comment, I think perhaps you contradict yourself; I believe it was you who suggested that loosenes=daubing and a lack of effort.
I threw this out if the first place because, in my experience, when at exhibitions and the like, visitors almost always seem to be more impressed with the precise and tight works rather than the loose and free (general terms I’m using for brevity). I often stand around and earwig on the comments people make. I sketch outside but make my paintings in the studio. I know that I very easily get sucked into trying to paint detail and it always ends up stiff and awkward. The breakthrough with any painting is most usually when I find, for myself, the ‘why?’ From there on the how is easy, although it may still take some days of layering the paint until little of the original is visible.
Posted
Perfectly possible that I contradict myself, but I'm replying to bump this post back to where it would have been had a gentleman from India not parasitized the thread in order to sell something.
And it's also perfectly possible, even likely, that you meant Robert Ward - it's just that, like a dog, if I hear my name I am instantly on the alert for biscuity treats.
Edited
by Robert Jones, NAPA
Posted
And en reponse to your latest post - - my least favourite expression heard at a gallery or exhibition is 'ooh, it's just like a photo!'. Well, take a b. photo then, if that's what you want - pure technique might be craftsmanship, but that's all it is.
My problem with the comparison you offered, though, was that I don't think Ross was, in any sense, even a craftsman - there are, literally, one or two of his paintings that weren't half bad, because now and then he forgot his own compositional rules - but in many of them he took on more than he had the technical skill to accomplish. That's incompetent, rather than tight. If you want tight, my usual example is the work of Sir Edward Burne-Jones - who could at least paint.
Posted
I wasn’t completely certain that the first one was an actual Bob Ross, that’s because most of his students/followers all paint in exactly the same style, using the very same brushes and palette, not to mention subject matter. Enough said on that one!
The second one, as I stated at the time, clearly was by the talented and highly successful artist Louise Balaam. It’s a fair bet to say that not many on this forum will have heard this name before, but everyone will have heard and recognise the work of Bob Ross...
I’m not sure what point I’m making here - but some may have a view on that! Robert J perhaps!
Edited
by Alan Bickley
Posted
It'd be surprising if people hadn't heard of Ross, because he still inhabits YouTube, and he, and his company, were very good at self-promotion. There are hundreds, thousands even, of very good artists working today of whom few of us will have heard - that's life, I suppose, in a world dominated by the advertising industry. Here, though, is where art magazines can come in and earn their place in the artistic scheme of things, if they move beyond their set stable of contributors (eg, more Alan Bickley, please!) and give the less well-known a showing. There are painters - Ray Balkwill comes to mind - whose work has always interested me - whom I'd never had heard of if it weren't for The Artist magazine. Some artists just aren't very good at self-promotion - if the public sees only Ross-clones, that's what they'll expect of 'art', I suppose. Which is why his work gives me the shivers....
Posted
Thanks for that contribution Robert, yes of course the magazines do a good job to highlight these artists, their exhibitions, workshops and so on.
Bob Ross has never been taken seriously by the ‘art world’, the reasons for this are of course obvious to most of us.
Yes, he did market and promote himself fully, the half-hour slot on I think it was Channel 4 gave him access to a wide audience.
As for new contributors, I am delighted that I have a feature appearing in the summer edition of The Artist, not oil painting, but line and wash! I hope that some of you will find it of interest!