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Impasto
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Taking my last look at the National Gallery Van Gogh exhibition this week, before it closes, I thought I look at his use of impasto.
I once thought it was down to his pure exuberance, that he used paint so thickly, but I now see, it was also expedience.
Rather than mix up various shades to indicate shadows, he used the shadow cast by the paint itself. He also, I think, used impasto for those elements he wanted to bring our attention to, other elements in the same picture, necessary for composition but not the focus... he left flat. Examples in the building to the left side compared to the tree on the right.
From the Yellow house.
And this is a perhaps 2 inch square section of his Courtyard of the Arles hospital, where you notice his Irises to the left of the tree. Recognisable, because of the use of impasto.
Impressive!
This is the understanding one gains by looking at a real, physical painting rather than a reproduction. Impasto, used selectively, is a very useful addition to the armoury of a painter in opaque media, and particularly available to the oil painter. I've never seen a Van Gogh in the flesh - so hadn't realized the extent to which he employed it.
One other thing that strikes me from the enlargement of detail is that he doesn't seem to paint on a toned canvas: there was a question on one of the Facebook art pages the other day, "does it really help to paint on a toned ground?" - to which there are several answers, basically "yes", and "yes but...": some of the Impressionists liked to use the white of the canvas to make their paintings much brighter than the traditional means of more classical artists, who built up their paintings in layers on the basis of a warm (usually) imprimatura: and it's that, perhaps more even than the brighter colours they used, which give their works a lighter, cleaner appearance. The only problem to avoid then is the odd spot of raw (but primed) canvas - little white pin-pricks peeping through the paint. "The sure mark of the amateur", as I remember a rather sniffy article I read donkey's years ago claiming: that and leaving a white line between objects because one's afraid to paint up to and over the edge of them - the advice was a bit on the prescriptive side, but as I'd just come from an exhibition in which an otherwise good painter had exhibited precisely those faults, I did take note of it...
Doesn't apply to van Gogh, of course, who knew what he was doing; just an observation on the need to take and the usefulness of taking a good look at the detail of construction if you want to be a painter yourself - there are Impressionists who quite deliberately left bare canvas showing, too - the dangers of that are obvious, but it was part of, and helps to explain, the move away from the classical method.
Yes, many photographs don't do him justice. To see such output over the last two years of his life.
This is the first picture in the exhibition which triggered my impasto search. My how-did-they-do-it approach to exhibitions.
Public Garden with Couple and Blue Fir tree.
Its always interesting to see close-up detail of a painting. Lovely posts, Norrette and your comments are also interesting to read. When I went to London, I saw the length of the queue unbelievable, but well worth the wait, I'm sure.
From the Yellow house.
Impressive!
