I know that I invited you to come along with me on this journey in the last post…I guess it would be good if I actually showed up!! ahh, life!! is anyone else busy??!!!

My intention is not to do a book report, but only to gleen from different sources snipets of observations and impressions about Impressionism and its artists…

I am enjoying reading a little from “Techniques of the Impressionists” by Anthea Callen…I have stopped to take in the title page which has a close up of a painting by Monet. First impressions….so much movement in the water, I am guessing from the technique Monet employed in painting it…a background of medium blue with what appears to be a wet on wet addition of different colors of blue, green, yellow and an off-white, producing a “glistening” of sunlight effect on the water. He even painted over the tops of the trees with this white effect giving the appearance of water sparkling through the tree branches…

I love the passion and freedom displayed in the way Monet dragged colors across the foreground…terra cotta, greens, purple, white…He must have been working very quickly…gestural, painterly strokes of colors…creating shadows, texture and highlights. These energetic flashes of pigment communicate roughly the time of day and the atmospheric conditions among other things.

Our own eyes see like this…they flit around the subject matter, focusing at certain areas taking in pieces of the whole…and our brains do the rest. They fill in what’s not there…they connect the pieces to make a whole. Some artists train very hard to be able to take in the subject matter more quickly…but it takes a lot of time to develop this skill…

more next time…