The 7th annual Masterpiece Christian Artists Conference "Envision"
May 30 - June 2, 2012
"Without a vision the people perish..."
Proverbs 29:18
This was a wonderful conference! We had so much fun and left very inspired. There was good teaching and fun people to be
with through the four days. The teacher worked with us to learn,
practice and move to that next level.
I painted with Thomas
Blackshear in the first two workshops. One was a portrait and the other
a full figure, beautiful models, poses and very helpful instruction.
The last workshop for me was with David Darrow. Chris Hopkins, our
resident instructor, and Dennis Lewis are there each year to give the
participants a critique of their work. They really helpful in following
our progress, suggesting how we can improve and challenging us to make
that next step.
A friend emailed a photo of me doing a life painting,
along with a group of fellow artists in David Darrow's workshop. David
walked us through step by step, starting with very dark colors, which
forced me to make darker mixtures through out and I was pleased with the
outcome.
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| "Kim" 14x11 |
The challenge of life painting is as
artists we stand before a beautiful human being bathed in light, with
subtle skin tones varying value and temperature. All we have to express
this beauty is pigment mixed with oil and whatever skills we have
developed. In these workshops the models were lit with incandescent
light, giving the light side a peachy orange tone, with the sky light
from the windows putting cool tones in the shaded side. I tend to see
too much light in the shadow side of fair skin people, the delicate pink
and grey tones there tends to fool me into painting lighter. I have to
remember to squint and compare one area with another to see the subtle
transitions from dark to light, as well as create a separation from dark
to light. For now I need to err on the side of painting darker.
