The Painter in Oil Part 22

=Nature the Suggester.=--Take your suggestions, your ideas, for pictures from nature. Keep your eyes open. Observe all poses which may hint of possible schemes of light and shade, of composition, or of color. It is marvellous how constantly groupings and poses and effects of all kinds occur in every-day life. Humanity is kaleidoscopic in its succession of changes; one after another giving a phase new and different, but equally suggestive of a picture if you will take the hint. The picture which originates in a natural occurrence is always true if it is sincerely and frankly painted. Truth is more various than fiction. It is easier to see than to invent. And in the arrangement of the material which nature freely and constantly furnishes to him there is scope for all the invention of man.

=Action and Character.=--The picture comes from the action--resides in it. The action comes from the act, and is natural to it, expressive of it. Any gesture or position which is the natural and unaffected result of an essential action will be true and vital, suggestive of nature, and beautiful because it will inevitably have character--be characteristic. The beauty of the picture is not something external to the costumes, occupations, and life which surround you, but is to be found, contained in it, and brought out, manifested, made visible, by the mere logical working out of the need, the custom, or the occasion.

Emphasis is only the salience of the most natural movement.

Daily life swarms with pictures. You do not need to go to other places and other times for subjects. If you are awake to what is going on around you, if you see the essential line of the occupation, or the ma.s.s and color which is incidental to every least activity, you will have more suggested to you than you have time to do justice to. And it is your business to see the beautiful in the commonplace. Everything is commonplace till you see the charm in it. The artistic possibility does not lie in the unusual in any subject, but in the fact that the thing cannot get done without action and grouping and color and contrast; and these are the artist's opportunities. Keep your eyes open for them; learn to recognize them when you see them; look for these rather than for the details of the accidental fact which brings them out. See the movement of it, and the relation of it to what surrounds it, and you will hardly avoid seeing the picture in it.

Here is a composition which is an almost literal rendering of the movement and light and shade effect of a position quite accidentally seen.

The whole effect of lighting and of line, the grouping and the pose, resulted purely from the musician's desire to get a good light on his music. There was no need to add to it. It was simply necessary to recognize the charm of it, and to represent that charm through it as frankly as it could be done.

[Ill.u.s.tration: =Sketch of a Flute Player.= _D. Burleigh Parkhurst._]

=Posing the Model.=--Let the character of the model suggest the pose.

If you have a scheme for a picture, choose a model whose personality will lend itself naturally to the occupation or action natural to that scheme. Then follow the suggestion which you find in the model. Some rearrangement will always be necessary if you do not use as a model the same person who originally gave you the idea for the picture.

Every human being has a different manner. You cannot hope for exactly the same expression in one person that you found in another. But put the model as nearly as you can in the same situation and pose, and then when the model eases from the unnatural muscular balance into the one natural to him, you will find the idea taken from your first observation translated into the characteristics of your present model.

Never try to place a model in a pose which he can only hold by an unnatural strain. You will not get a satisfactory result from it.

Study your model; see what poses he most naturally falls into, and then take advantage of one of these, and arrange your picture with reference to it.

Never attempt to represent a character in your picture by using a model of a different cla.s.s or type from it; you will not be successful either in painting a lady from a model who is a peasant, nor in painting a peasant from a model who is a lady. The life and occupation and thought common to your model will get into your painting of her; and if that is not in accordance to the idea in the picture, your picture will be false. The dress, no less than the pose and occupation, must be such as is natural to your model. The accessories of your picture must befit the character you wish to paint; otherwise your model becomes no more than a lay figure.

Take note of the characteristics which are peculiar to your model, and use them; do not change them nor idealize them. Rather paint them as they are, and make them a vital part of your study of the subject.

This is the best you can do with these characteristics. They may be the most expressive thing in your picture. If they are of such a nature that you cannot use them in this way, then do not use this model at all; you cannot get rid of these things. In trying to obscure or idealize them, you only lose character, or paint a character into your model which is unnatural to him; the result will not be satisfactory.

=Quiet Sitters.=--An inexperienced painter should not use a model with too much vivacity of body or of expression. The quiet, reposeful, thoughtful model, who will change little in position or manner, will simplify the problem. A model too wide awake or too sleepy will either of them give you trouble.

Avoid very young children as models, and particularly babies. They are never quiet, and the problems you will have even with the best of models will be made enormously more difficult by their restlessness.

For your first work choose models with well-marked faces, and pose them in a direct light which will give you the simplest and strongest effect of light and shade.

See that your sitter is in as comfortable a position as you can get him into, so that the pose can be held easily. Don't attempt difficult and unusual att.i.tudes. Such things require much skill and knowledge to take advantage of, and to use successfully. Make your effect more in the study of composition and color than in fanciful poses. Later, when you have gained experience, you may do this sort of thing.

If you are painting a face, see that the eyes are in at a restful angle with the head, and that they are not facing a too strong light, nor are obliged to look at a blank s.p.a.ce. Give them room to have a restful focus, and perhaps something pleasant or interesting to look at.

=Length of Pose.=--No sitter can hold a pose in perfect motionlessness. Do not expect it. You must learn to make allowance for certain slight changes which are always occurring. You must give your model plenty of rest, too, especially if he be not a professional model. A half-hour pose to ten minutes' rest is as much as a regular model expects to do as a rule. If you have a friend posing for you, particularly if it be a woman, twenty minutes' pose and ten minutes'

rest, for a couple of hours, is all you should expect; and if the pose is a standing one, this will probably be more than she can hold--make the rests longer.

An inexperienced model--and sometimes even a trained one--is likely to faint while posing, particularly if the room be close. Look out for this; watch your sitter, and see that she is not looking tired. The minute that you see the least sign of fatigue, if she shows pallor--rest. Do not get so absorbed in your canvas that you do not notice your model's condition. If you are observing and studying your model as closely as you should, you can hardly fail to notice any change that may occur, and you should at once give her relief.

=Distance.=--Don't work too near your model, nor too near your canvas.

As regards the first, be far enough away to see the whole of the figure you are painting, or of that part which you are doing, entirely at one focus of the eye, and yet near enough to see the detail clearly. If you are too near, you see parts at a time, and do not see it as a whole. If you are too far, you see too generally for good study. You might make it a rule to be away from your subject a distance of about three or four times the extreme measurement of it.

If it is a full length, say fifteen to twenty feet, if you can get so large a room. If it is a head and shoulders, about six or eight feet.

Never get closer than six feet.

As to your canvas, work at arm's length. Don't bend over--again you see parts, and you must treat your canvas as a whole. Never rest your hand or arm on the canvas. Train your arm to be steady. Sit up straight, hold your brush well out at the end of the handle, and your arm extended; now and then, if you need closer work, lean forward, and if necessary use a rest-stick; but as a rule your work will be stronger and hang together better if you work as I have suggested. Of course you will often get up, and walk away from your work. Set your easel alongside the model, and go away to a distance, and compare them. Too intense application to the canvas forgets that relations, effect, and wholeness of impression are of the greatest importance, and are only to be judged of when seen at some distance.

=Background.=--Under the general t.i.tle of background you may place everything which will come in as accessory to the figure, and against or alongside of which it stands. The picture must "hang together"; must have envelopment; must be a whole, not an aggregation of parts.

Everything that goes to the making up of this whole must have a natural and logical connection with it. From the first conception of the picture you must consider the background as an essential part of it, and as something which will have a vital effect upon the figure.

The color of the background must be thought of as a part of, because affecting, the figure itself. The simplicity or variety in the background, the number of objects in it, must be considered as to the effect on the figure also. You cannot make the background a patchwork of objects and colors without interfering with the effect of the main thing in the picture.

If your figure is simple and quiet, keep the background the same. Make it a principle to treat the background simply always. If the character of the case demands some detail, and a variety of objects, then treat them so that their effect is as simple as possible; and the figure must be made stronger, in order that the variety in the background shall not overpower it. Control it by the way the light or the color ma.s.ses, or simplify the painting of them. Keep the background in value as regards prominence and relief of objects as well as in the matter of color.

=Composition of Backgrounds.=--You can make the background help the figure, not merely by the painting of objects which help to explain,--that is of course,--but in the placing and arranging of them you may emphasize the composition. Whether the background be a curtain with its folds, or an interior with its furniture, you can and must make every object, every fold of the drapery, every ma.s.s of wall or object, distinctly help out in the composition as line and ma.s.s. Your composition must balance; the line and movement of the figure must have its true relation. The way you use whatever goes into the picture, the objects which make up the background, the way they group, and the s.p.a.ces between them, must have a helpful reference to that movement, and to the balance of the whole.

=Simplicity.=--Lean always towards simplicity in composition as against complexity. In backgrounds particularly, avoid detail and over-variety. Don't have the whole surface of the canvas spotted with _things_. If it is necessary, put it in; if it is not necessary, leave it out; and if there is the slightest doubt which it is, leave it out.

The most common and the most fatal mistake is to make the picture too "interesting." The interest in a picture does not lie in the quant.i.ty of things expressed, but in the character of them, and in the quality of their representation. If you cannot treat a simple composition well, if you cannot make a picture balance well, and make it interesting with a quiet background, be sure a mult.i.tude of objects will not help it. The more you put into it the worse it will be. Learn to be master of the less before you try to be master of the more.

[Ill.u.s.tration: =Milton Dictating "Paradise Lost."= _Munkacsy._ To show use of background. Notice also the composition.]

=Lighting.=--I have spoken of lighting in general in other chapters.

You must apply the principles to your use of figures. Study the different effects which you can get on the model by the different ways of placing in reference to the window. Whatever lighting will be difficult in one kind of painting will be no less so in another. Avoid cross-lights, and do not be ambitious to try unusual and exceptional effects. If one should occur to you as charming, of course do it, if it is not too difficult, but don't go around hunting for the strange and weird. There is beauty enough for all occasions in such effects as are constantly coming under your observation. What was said about simplicity of subject will apply here as well, for the light and color effect is naturally a part of the subject. The most practical lights are those which fall from one side, so as to give simple ma.s.ses of light and dark; they should come from above the level of the head, so as to throw the shadow somewhat downwards.

="Contre Jour."=--One kind of posing with reference to lighting, gives very beautiful effect, but calls for close study of values, and is very difficult. It is called in French, _contre jour_; that is, literally, "against the day," or, against the light. It is a placing of the model so that the light comes from behind, and the figure is dark against the light. From its difficulty it should not be taken as a study by a beginner, for modelling and color are difficult enough at best. When they are to be gotten in the low key that the light behind necessitates, and with the close values which this implies, the difficulty is enormously increased. But before you attempt the human figure in the open air, you will find it very good study to work in the house _contre jour_. The effect of a figure out-doors has many of the qualities of _contre jour_. The diffusion of light and the many reflections make the problem more complex; but the contrast, the close values, and the subtle modelling which you must study in _contre jour_ will be good previous training before going out-doors with a model.

Look at Millet's "Shepherdess Spinning," at the head of this chapter, as an example of _contre jour_.

=Figures Out-of-doors.=--In painting, an object is always a part of its environment. So a figure must partake of the characteristics of its surroundings. Out-of-doors it is part of the landscape, characterized by the qualities which are peculiar to landscape. The diffusion of light, the vibration and the movement of it, the brilliancy and pitch, the cross-reflections and the envelopment,--all these give to the figure a quality quite different from that which it has in the house. There is no such definiteness either of drawing, or of light and shade, or of color. The problem is a different one. You must treat your figure no more as something which you can control the effect of, but as something which, place it in what position, in what surroundings, you will, it will still be affected by conditions over which you have no control.

Textures and surface qualities, local or personal colors, lose their significance to the figure out-of-doors. They become lost in other things. The pose, the action, the ma.s.s, the note of color or value,--these are what are of importance. The more you search for the qualities which would be a matter of course in the house, the more you will lose the essential quality,--the quality of the fact of out-doors.

When in the house, you can have things as definite as you wish; out-doors you will find a continual play of varying color and light.

The shadows do not fall where you expect them to. The values are less marked. The stillness of the pose is interfered with by the constant movement of nature. The color is influenced by the diffused color of the atmosphere and the reflected color of the gra.s.s, the trees, and the sky. The light does not fall _on_ the face so much as it falls _around_ it. The modelling is less, the planes are not precise. The expression is as much due to the influence of what is around it as to the face itself.

All this means that you must study and paint the figure from a new point of view. You do not make so much of what the model is as how the model looks in these surroundings. You must not look for so much decision, and you must study values closely. Look more for the modelling of the ma.s.s than for the modelling of surface. Look more for the vibration of light and air on the flesh and drapery colors than for these colors in themselves. Look for color of contours in the model. Study the subtleties of values of contours, and make your figure relieve by the contrast of value in ma.s.s rather than by the modelling within the outline. See how the figure "tells" as a whole against what is behind it first, and keep all within that first relation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: =Buckwheat Harvest.= _Millet._]

It is possible to look for and to find many of the qualities which distinguish the figure in the studio light; sometimes you may want to do so. The telling of a story, the literary side of the picture, if you want that side, sometimes needs help that way. But in this you lose larger characteristics, and the picture as a whole will not have the spirit of open air in it.

What has been said of the painting of landscape applies to the painting of figures in landscapes. Pose your figure out-of-doors if you would represent it out-of-doors. Then paint it as if it were any other out-door object. If the figure is more important to the composition than anything else in the landscape, as it often will be, then study that mainly, and treat the rest as background, but as background which has an influence which must be constantly recognized.

Never finish a figure begun out-doors by painting afterwards from a model posed in the house. Leave the figure as you bring it in. If it is not finished, at least it will be in keeping with itself; and this will surely be lost if you try to work it from a model in different conditions.

=Animals.=--Animals should be considered as "figures out-of-doors."

There is no essential difference in the handling one sort of a figure or another. The anatomy is different, and the light falls on different textures, but the principle is not changed. You must consider them as forms influenced by diffused light and diffused color, and paint them so. You will find that often, especially in full sunlight, the color peculiar to the thing itself is not to be seen at all. The character of the light which falls on it gives the note, and controls. In the shade the effect is less marked, but the constant flicker makes the same sort of variation, though not to the same extent.

There is no secret of painting animals either in the house or out-of-doors which is not the same as the secret of painting the human figure. If you would paint an animal, get one for a model and study it. Work in some sort of a house-light first, in a barn or shed, or, if it be a small animal, in your studio. Study as you would any other thing, from a chair to a man. The principles of drawing do not change with the character of anatomy. The animal may be less amiable a poser, but you must make allowance for that.

When you have got a knowledge of the form, and the character of color and surface, take the animal out-doors, get some one to help hold him, and apply the same principles that would govern your study of a rock or a tree in the open air.

As for fur, and all that sort of thing, treat it as you would any other texture-problem in still life.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV