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| A recent painting unfinished in the studio. |
Many artists talk about wanting to share what they 'see' in their subject as their reason for painting. I never really understood what that meant until recently. An artist takes a delight in seeing what they call beauty. To him that is more than just liking it and not really knowing why it looks nice. An artist has to truely understand what makes something beautiful. What makes it beautiful visually because that is his language -- painting is purely a visual language. The painter sees colour, shapes, values, edges, composition, and the ways these elements come together and contrast to look pleasing to the eye, and to an an artist that is what is beautiful. And he wants to share those beautiful colours, shapes, and edges with others, they are often more beautiful and meaningful to the artist than the subject itself.
Anyone who looks at something and calls it beautiful dose so because what they are looking at has shape, colour, light, values, and edges, all combined in an aesthetically pleasing way. This is what an artist understands, or attempts to understand: How the eye sees, and what makes things pleasing to the eye. - Pleasing to the eye meaning the appreciation we feel when we see something beautiful, and which then can evoke feelings and thoughts which uplift and bring joy.
It is my greatest ambition to be able to really see things and understand how I see them, and to master a set of skills in order to interpret what I see in reality onto a two dimensional canvass. I do not wish to copy nature like a scanner, instead I want to interpret it. To find out what makes something look like it dose, to find out what drew me to paint that certain combination of shape, colour, values, and edges, and then to put it on canvass - to share at least a glimpse of what inspires me.
