Caumsett, Late Afternoon, 4/14

I hiked about two miles to the beach at Caumsett, by which time it was already almost 6 p.m. The park closes at dusk which at this point in April is about 7:15. I figured that the hike back would take me a half hour and I didn't want to be stumbling around in the dark. So that didn't leave much time to paint. That meant that this was about forty minutes of painting.

Back at home I spent another hour to hour and a half finishing this. It's 11 by 14 inches, oil on linen.

America, where gimmicks trump genuine achievement

When people talk about artist Scott Wade's dirty pictures they are not referring to the salacious content but to his preferred medium, grimy car windshields. I have to admit this is an amusing idea, particularly when the subject is the reinterpretation of a renaissance masterpiece like Boticelli's Venus.

But browsing through his site, one eventually has to confront a question like this: Aside from the choice of medium, how good is he as an artist? In this country it sometimes appears that we value cleverness over actual achievement, wit over work.

Maybe Marshal McLuhan was right. The medium is the message.

Hands and arms

There is nothing better than working on that at which you are weakest. Hands? Noses? Ears? If they are a weak point it's good to hit the weakness head-on and work on it until it's no longer a weakness.

Marcello

From Saturday afternoon at the Art Students League in New York. A long pose, about an hour and 20 minutes.

Diana in the American Wing at the Met

Quick sketch. Kinda makes Diana look like she's standing on a stack of books, doesn't it. Oh well, a 15 minute sketch from the cafe in the enclosed courtyard there. Very relaxing spot.

'The Mourners' at the Met

In the group of artists with whom I associate, everybody is talking about the show of drawings by Bronzino at the Met. It is an unusual and perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime show that brings together all of the 70 or so drawings known by this artist.

OK, I did see the show but maybe I'm a bit jaded, or maybe it's because I've been looking at reproductions of many of these drawings for years. Maybe it was that stuffy, claustrophobic, dark room where the Met holds all of its drawing shows, but I was not as excited as I expected to be.

The show that DID excite me is on the first floor in the Met's Medieval Galleries and it's simply called "The Mourners." The mourners in question are a series of 37 or so alabaster sculptures created by Jean de la Huerta and Antoine Le Moiturier for the base of the tomb of John the Fearless, duke of Burgundy. They were created in the mid-15th century and most are in exquisite condition after 560 years.

Part of the charm experienced when viewing these sculptures is that they are each only about 16 inches tall. Another part of the magic is the dramatic manner in which the Met has lit them. Follow this link to the Met's description the show and look for the further link there to the FRAME display online which will allow viewers to rotate each of these little masterpieces 360 degrees.

Saturday afternoon

No matter what else has gone on during the rest of the week, I know that on Saturday afternoon I can drop into a zen-like state as I try to render the human form as observed in the model's poses at the Art Students League. The League has been in operation since the 1870s and has occupied its current building since 1898. The studio where we draw is on the second floor across from the gallery. I was told that our second floor studio was used at one time by William Merritt Chase, among others. But the roster of students who've studied there is as impressive as the faculty.

James Lancel McElhinney teaches anatomy and drawing the human figure there and I've been working as his monitor for a couple of years now. For more info on the class and what it has to offer follow this link to our Facebook page.