Umbrella Company, oil on canvas, 20320in (51351cm). A painting, whether figurative or abstract, is a flat pattern made of tones, shapes, colours, and textures. Here, alternate dark and light tones march across the canvas from side to side, with reflections used to endorse the vertical ‘stripe’ and the slanting elliptical shapes of the umbrellas positioned to cross the horizontal axes. If the visual pattern works for the viewer, the result is pleasing to the eye. Colours used: titanium white, Mars black, ultramarine blue, light red, Indian yellow, cadmium red
The pleasing double-numbered arrangement of this year’s date and its association to perfect ocular acuity makes an apposite title for this series on how to hone artistic vision. My intention is to help you see with 20/20 clarity for the rest of 2020 and beyond! The eyes are an artist’s primary tool, but what does it actually mean to see as an artist? What do artists look for, what is it that they see and then paint? And at the end how do they see their own painting clearly enough to assess if it works and is, indeed, finished? These are questions this series will address.
First, a caveat: artistic vision is unique and subjective (thankfully), so I express only my point of view, which is certainly not definitive. I once tutored a weekend workshop entitled ‘Learning to See’, in which I tried to sum up what I had learned during four years at art college.