Tuesday, January 8, 2013

9 Chocolate and Flowers

Diane Mannion, Chocolate and Flowers, 8x10" o/c

      9th for 30/30 Challenge.  Started this one while teaching a painting class this morning.  Susan brought chocolates to share which we consumed with gusto after painting.  Wild group, didn't get much accomplished on this painting until I got home.  The baby food jar's a device I use to teach students to look at the form and study how the bottom turns.  No, it's not flat with pointy corners, the form turns... sometimes our brains trick us into seeing forms like a symbol instead of what it is.  If I can only teach students to SEE... to really look at what they're drawing... then they'll be better artists!
      And it always helps to have someone else look at your work.  Showed John this one and he spotted something that looked like an optical illusion (like a cheap  magic trick, he said).  I hadn't noticed it at all until he pointed it out.  Corrected it, so don't try to find it now.  The stem on the foreground flower had looked like it punched a hole in the middle of the lid, went down, and reappeared inside the glass!  Made the stem longer and wiped out the place where it appeared to connect.  Looking and really seeing isn't easy!

4 comments:

Kathleen said...

Back in the day I taught high school art for a while. You are so right about thinking getting in the way of seeing! I used a lot of exercises from Betty Edward's book 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain'. It must be very difficult to try to teach these things in a painting workshop.

Diane Mannion said...

Useful book, a classic... I tell all my students about it. Yes, it is difficult teaching this in a workshop for adults. Some show up and want to go home with a painting, thinking they can paint without knowing how to draw! Boggles the mind.

Anne Winthrop Cordin said...

So much truth in your comments about seeing. I love this painting, especially how you handled the glass.

Diane Mannion said...

Thank you, Anne.