Notan is a word taken from Japanese art.  It refers to seeing a subject in terms of flat shapes of black and white.  It sometimes uses just 2 values: black and white.  More practically we can use 3 values: white, black and mid grey.  You can of course use more values but I find the real benefit is to translate a subject into 3 values.  It’s a fabulous discipline. 

Why Bother?

The point is if the 3 value study works then you can be pretty confident that the painting will work.  If your pattern of lights and darks doesn’t work it will show up in these quick little sketches.  Notan is a skill that has to be practiced to master it.  It’s very easy to understand it but not so easy to do it.

One thing we learn is that there are so many decisions that go into simplifying a subject.  I guess I would say that simplifying is not simple.  Not simple but very worthwhile.

Practicing Notan enables us to analyze a subject or photo before we paint it.  This is part of the journey of improving our art.

Examples of Notan

The Benefits

Like any new skill it takes time and practice to master Notan.  However, the benefits are truly worth while.  It’s a lens through which we see subjects differently.  It simplifies and focuses the way we look at a subject.  It gives us a tremendous advantage when we come to paint a subject.  Finally it’s quick and a lot of fun. 

One of the main benefits is that  Notan forces us to simplify the subject.  When we simplify we learn that a lot of the detail doesn’t actually add much to the painting.  

In Summary

Adding Notan to your arsenal of painting  tools will, without doubt, take your painting to new levels.  I really encourage you to give it a shot. It  makes our painting process more intentional.  It will lead inevitably to better paintings!

The post Notan first appeared on Rex Beanland.

Anyway, this is one painting I did.  It’s based on my plein air study.  It’s a view from the top of the valley looking down on Rosebud.  I been drawn to this view for a number of years but I was never sure how to paint it.  This style is something completely new for me which makes this painting super exciting.

This next image is a view of the ‘downtown’.  Again I’ve looked at this scene many times and it never really spoke to me.  This time I had a bit of time to kill and I wanted to try something so I just started with a little pencil sketch and all of a sudden I thought there was some potential.  This really showed me that anything can be turned into a good subject. It’s all about the eye of the beholder.  So don’t keep looking for the perfect scene.  Work with what you have and turn that into a great painting.  This is a plein air study.  

It was a great time and many thanks to all the organizers who made me  and all the other participating artists feel so welcome.

The post Rosebud Plein Air Weekend first appeared on Rex Beanland.

The participants in the workshop were also an especially great group to work with.  

The Paintings
 Piazza del Popolo

The first demo was of the Piazza del Popolo. It’s a great subject that teaches so many useful watercolour skills. We took a lot of time learning how to create a mass of background figures.

I’m including a detail of these figures. They tend to look unfinished when you look at them up close but from a distance they magically become figures.

Another thing that I use frequently in urban landscape painting is what I call ‘ghost figures’. They are figures in the foreground that are there to draw you in to the painting. I particularly like the way that their lower half sort of disappears.

The participants’ examples.

Granville St

The last demo we did  was a scene from Granville St in Vancouver.  We didn’t have time to finish it but you can see that everyone is well on their way.

Boats At Gibsons

We also did a painting of boats at Gibsons.  This was a challenging painting but as you can see from our Wall Of Fame  it was also well done.

The workshops are now being held in the High Beam Dreams which I believe was originally a church.  A great space.

My demos

Here are the paintings I did.  I finished them off at home.

Thanks

I just love teaching art so it was a wonderful experience being in Gibsons.  Many thanks to everyone who participated for making it such a great experience.  Thanks also to Dee for being my excellent assistant!

Plein Air Painting

After the workshop Susan and I spent a week meandering to the end of the Coastal Highway (about 150 km).  I did a few plein air paintings which I super enjoyed.  I remember so much more of a location when I paint it then I ever do from a photograph.  It’s the greatest way to visit new locations.

It was truly a great experience!

The post Gibsons Landing Workshop first appeared on Rex Beanland.

Here is the painting as it was when I finished the demo (1 1/2 hours).

I spent about another hour in the studio and this is the final version.

I’m really happy with the painting and I’m over the moon with the process.  I think I can use this technology to continue my teaching in this most challenging of times.

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This is a painting of the Empire Building in Edmonton.  This painting just uses the basic shape of the buildings as they actually are.  I wanted to see if I could completely change the lighting to go with this extreme sunrise theme. I also wanted to see if the building were interesting enough shapes. The painting turned out absolutely fine, but nothing special.

I thought both the sunrise theme and the shapes of the buildings were fine but then why isn’t it very interesting. The thing that jumped out was that the buildings in the background are as detailed as the closer buildings.  This gets the eye wandering down to the background too much.  I asked myself what is my story?  Where do I want your eye to go?  For me the story is the life on the street in the front so in this painting there are too many distractions.   

So I redid it with the clear intention to push the background buildings further back and keep the detail only in the closest buildings.

In this version your eye is definitely drawn more to the foreground.  It’s a more focused and comfortable visual experience.  

Lesson learned!

The post What’s Your Story? first appeared on Rex Beanland.

It has been a while since I taught this particular workshop and once again I came to appreciate how much fun it can be and yet how many useful watercolour techniques are involved.

It was a great group of participants and we formed a very supportive and enthusiastic group.  

The three main activities were a fun way to do figures, a painting of Haystack Rock and a painting of a pond near Cameron Lake in Waterton Park.

As I mentioned it’s always the people that make the workshop!

These are just a few shots from the workshop.

Thanks to everyone for a great workshop.

The post Experimental Watercolour Workshop first appeared on Rex Beanland.

The top image is the result of my interest in the work of Nita Engle.  She is an American watercolourist famous for using experimental techniques to create realistic effects in  watercolour.  I love the work she does and the effects she is able to get by throwing paint, using special tools and really playing with the water.   She also has a way of stretching the paper that ensures that it won’t buckle at all.  My one hesitation with her process is her extensive use of mask.  In some paintings she ends up covering almost half the paper with mask and on large works that is a lot of mask.  She also takes ages to finish a painting because of all the steps involved and the drying time between stages.   In this image I followed her process entirely including stretching the paper and masking out all the snow and all the highlights in the background.  Doing it this way does free you up to get more spontaneous mixing in the water and the background.  This was my first attempt at using her process completely.  I used an image that I’ve painted many times: the creek right at the top of Elbow Falls.  I learned lots by doing it and enjoyed the attempt.  The painting has some good points but overall it’s not very successful.  I think I’m at my best when I paint very directly and  feed off being in the moment and I get lost when I have to wait overnight to let various sections dry.  Also and for me, most importantly, when using mask I get locked into the shapes I mask out before I’ve even started painting.  This process doesn’t allow the chance to respond to what happens as the paint is applied.

The bottom image above is a similar scene but it was done completely in a direct manner.  In this one rather than masking out the trees I lifted them out of the wet wash. I could lift them where I felt they needed to be according to what I had already painted.   I  added the light streaks on the ground that pass behind the trees after the painting was finished using gouache.  Using this process I can add the lights where the painting needs them rather than where I thought they should go before even beginning the painting.  As one of my art heros, Stephen Quiller, says frequently, ‘listen to the painting’.  It will tell you what it needs.

Overall this is just part of the art journey.  Explore, experiment and then  keep what works for you and discard the rest.  That’s what makes this such a fascinating journey for me.

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