David Slonim Workshop

I was invited to stay with friends in the Ft. Wayne, IN area and attend a David Slonim workshop sponsored by their art guild.  It was just one of the best workshops I have attended.  David presented some serious information on the fundamentals of art in a fun, playful way.  The emphasis of the 2 and 1/2 day workshop was not that we have a finished painting but that we learn some basic concepts about color harmony and design.  He borrows from the "old masters" to emphasize his points with plenty of good examples of these concepts.  He encouraged experimentation and moving outside our comfort zone.  David also stressed the importance of planning and designing our painting even if it means painting the same material in several different ways.  I am certainly going to make use of these tools as I move forward in my painting journey.  Thank you David!  (and thank you Barb and Karen for the wonderful week.)

After sketching out several drawings of possible compositions for my painting, I settled on this composition.  I loved the big, organic feel of the masses in this composition.  I then painted a gray scale version of what I thought my values would be, spending no more than 30-40 minutes.  I still liked the composition.  Now, my goal is to do a finished painting using my sketch, the photo, and the gray scale painting as reference material.  I may do the finished painting several times.  My plan for the first painting is to do a red/green color harmony and may move on to a split color harmony of yellow green, red violet, blue violet.  After all, this is experimentation!

One thing that I really was encouraged by was David's philosophy about art:  the goal should be about trying to create the best piece of art you can--not just create something that you think will sell.  One of his favorite quotes that he used frequently:  "Do not paint what you see, use what you see to create good art."  I wish I had heard that a few years ago!

If you have an opportunity to take or organize a David Slonim workshop--go for it!