After
reading James Gurney post, “How did John
Singer Sargent (1856-1925) find a painting subject?”
Sir Edmund
Gosse recalled:
"He
was accustomed to emerge [from the house where he was staying in Broadway,
England], carrying a large easel, to advance a little way into the open, and
then suddenly to plant himself down nowhere in particular, behind a barn,
opposite a wall, in the middle of a field. The process was like that in the
game of musical chairs where the player has to stop dead, wherever he may
happen to be, directly the piano stops playing. The other painters were all
astonished at Sargent never ‘selecting’ a point of view, but he explained it in
his half-articulate way. His object was to acquire the habit of reproducing
precisely whatever met his vision without the slightest previous ‘arrangement’
of detail, the painter’s business being, not to pick and choose, but to render
the effect before him, whatever they may be.”
One of the
challenges that I face is trying to find a great scenes with majestic distance
and “golden” light. After reading this post I brought my set up outside and sat
on the bench of my picnic table and started painting. Then half way through the
clouds broke and the sun came out and made the beautiful lines of light shining
through the tree and shed and just catching the tops of the shrubs.
Here the
link to James Gurneys post
Artist’s Shed
7x5 oil on board
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