Jane's Art Basics - How To Start A Painting?

 Do you get stuck at the blank canvas? Do you want to paint but don't know how to start? As your art practice evolves you will develop your own go-to strategies for beginning, but if you are new at painting, here are a few suggestions.

• Don't start a painting. Start multiple paintings. 
• Do start with an inexpensive, low-stakes, substrate such as Bristol or 80# Cheap Drawing Paper
• Do focus on the practice, the process, not the 'finished' painting.
• Don't try to finish a painting. 
• Do give yourself a time limit if that helps. 

Here is a video on The Five Minute Painting (this is an old one, not great quality):

 

A group of 9"x12" five-minute paintings

I made these 9"x12" five-minute in one session, which was a total of one hour.

Be assured that there are infinite ways to start a painting, so you can't find the correct way, nor can you start the wrong way, in terms of the first marks you make on the painting surface. You can start with an attitude that will facilitate beginnings. 

Your measure of success is: you showed up and applied paint (or collage or drawing) to a surface. You made marks on a substrate. That's IT. Omit the habitual evaluation and self-criticism. Just leave it out; it is totally irrelevant to this part of a painting practice. 

Let the painting practice be an ongoing inquiry, not a production line. You are discovering what the paint can do, what is in you, who you are as a maker of images. It is a long, slow, ongoing process. A practice. If you set your expectations accordingly it can be extremely engaging and fulfilling. If you begin with the expectation that you will Learn How To Do It Correctly, it can be very frustrating. You will make good paintings - your paintings - when you make a lot of paintings, with attention and focus on process, and with curiosity. Enjoy!

Cat Bennett has several books that are encouraging and helpful for making art as a practice. There are many other books and resources on practicing art, but the real learning is in doing the work. Get the paper out, put some paint on it, pay attention, repeat.

Works in The Works

I love keeping a lot of pieces UNfinished, in the works, in process.  These ongoing pieces allow me to just play and noodle around with visual Stuff on the surface and see what happens.  Today I took out some large-ish (19"x25") 5-minute paintings.  My idea was to just play with them a bit, and then do the exercise of using a viewfinder to find little mini-compositions within.  (This was part of developing some exercises for a workshop I'm doing at Omega next year that is geared towards those who are a little newer to art).  I did not get to the viewfinder part, but here is what happened:

Here is the original 5-minute painting with some collage added.

And then some paint applied...

And more paint applied...

And then a little bit more collage.  This is where I've left it.  Might be done, might not; I'm sure it will tell me at some point.

Below are two more that are similarly in the works, started from 19"x25" 5-minute paintings:

I have no idea where these are going, or if they will finish as 19"x25" pieces, or if I will actually get to continue the exercise of finding the compositions within.  Sometimes I just have no idea what I'm doing, so I just put some paint (or collage) on paper and the put some more paint (or collage) on paper. 

I am going to take a little break (couple of weeks, maybe more) from the blog.  I need to focus on my own work and I have a rather intense period of teaching ahead of me.  All fun, all good, but something has to give.  Thanks for visiting. 

The FIve-Minute Painting - Revisited

I've had this idea of the five-minute painting for a few months now, and here are some examples from a recent painting session:

The idea is to make time - the five minutes - and the size (9"x12") the only defining parameters.  So I set up my palette, get my brushes and other tools ready, and then hit the timer.  A few things I've noticed:

• This is not about painting fast; it's about getting a clear idea down in five minutes.
• The time parameter makes me focus much more strongly.
• I make marks that I would not make if I didn't have the timer on, so I develop some new things.
• I also make marks that are familiar to me.  Start with the familiar.
• Sometimes the painting "finishes" before the five-minutes are up, and my rule is to paint up until the last second.  So this challenges me to do something in the remaining time, choose an area to enhance or add to. 

The twelve above are all done in one session, which took about an hour and twenty minutes (time in between paintings to replenish the palette).  Many of the colors are straight out o the bottle, but I did mix some as well, within the five-minutes:

• Bubblegum pink: napthol red light + quinacridone magenta + white (just magenta and white is not enough, it makes it too sweet.  A little of a more primary red gives it the edge).
• Acid green:  nickel-azo yellow + celadon + white (optional); then add to that some turquoise for a greener green.

What is the value of the five-minute painting exercise?  At this point it seems like the value is mostly in the degree of focus and the possibility of new marks.  It also loosened me up quite a bit.  I will keep doing these sessions and see what happens.  See my previous five-minute paintings here and here, which I did on 25"x19" paper.  Working large was quite a different experience.

Here are a few of the individual paintings:

I would love to hear your thoughts on this.  Try it, and let me know what you experience!