Brian MacNeil joins the faculty at the Academy of Realist Art, Boston
The Academy of Realist Art, Boston would like to announce the addition of Brian MacNeil to our faculty. Brian is a graduate of the Angel Academy of Art in Florence. He has also studied with Marc Dalessio and Frank Covino. Brian has had a unique blend of artistic influences; he is a fine artist and a tattoo artist. You can discover more about Brian by visiting his website at www.brianmacneil.com
Master copy of Edwin Landseer painting
I thought you might enjoy seeing one of the paintings from the master copy workshop. Julie Beck is copying the painting Dignity and Impudence,
1939 by Sir Edwin Henry Landseer. The original is part of the Tate Collection in Britain.
Landseer was one of the best-known and popular British animal painters in the 19th century. He was a prodigy, already exhibiting drawings of animals at the Royal Academy by the age of 13. It is said that Landseer could paint with both hands at the same time.
Here you see Julie’s painting in two stages – the first is the dry brush stage. It was done primarily to establish the drawing on the canvas. She also used it to mass in a few of the value notes. This was done in burnt umber (one of the fastest driers on her palette).
In the second photo you see Julies painting during the “first painting” stage. Here Julie is using mosaic-like patches of paint to describe the form. The idea with this stage is that there is no blending. The edges are soft and the paint notes are organically shaped. As the viewer stands further back from the painting these patches should blend optically and the painting should look exactly like the subject. In this stage of our layered painting method students can easily correct and adjust any passages that are out of context – the drawing is easily adjusted as are color or value notes. Next Julie will go on top of this layer and make all her fine blendings and add the calligraphic strokes that describe the hair of the dogs.
I have also included Julie’s palette showing the value strings she mixed (as described in the last post). Her palette consisted of Cremnitz White, Cadmium Yellow, Yellow Ochre, Raw Umber, Cadmium Orange, Cadmium Red, Venetian Red, Alizarin Crimson, Burnt Umber, Ultramarine Blue and Ivory Black (all greens are mixed).
Master copy workshop
We finished the oil painting master copy workshop a week ago. 11 students participated in this information packed class. We were pleased to have had one student join us after travelling all the way from Iceland.
Instructor Joseph Pfeiffer-Herbert started the class by introducing choices for supports to paint on, he worked his way through methods and mediums and finished the workshop with glazing.
One of the things students found helpful was mixing a string of values for each color on their palette. Once the strings were complete color mixing was a little less daunting. Students made admixtures between colors by first identifying the hue and value that was close to what they needed and then only mixing colors of the same value together in order to refine the color.
Everyone who participated in the workshop said they learned a lot. Our thanks go out to Joseph for doing such a great job and for giving students some great lectures.
Joseph is turning a new page in his life. He will no longer be teaching at the Academy of Realist Art, Boston. We all wish Joseph the best in his new endeavors
