Charles Hawthorne: Bits of Critiques

 

"The Fisherman and His Daughter"
by Charles Hawthorne

• "Don't model little blue hats in an outdoor portrait - you saw this too much as a hat and not enough as a spot of color. Look at some positive dark to get the value of water behind the head - hold up the black handle of your palette knife to compare it with the darks in the subject."

•  "We must all teach ourselves to be fine, to be poets. Spend a lifetime in hard work with a humble mind. In his attempt to develop the beauty he sees, the artist develops himself."
  
  
•  Try coping with different sized canvases. There is a certain influence that the big area of canvas gives you - it makes you see things larger. There is one thing of which you may be sure, being able to paint large canvases does you no harm when you come to paint a small one. Take out large canvases - when I say a little one I mean a 16" x 20".
  
  
• "Simply graying won't do - in natures it is more than that. If you have done your job well, anyone can tell if it is morning or afternoon light by the color you use."
  
  
• "Don't be afraid of mixing your colors. Some of the most beautiful colors in a canvas are nothing but mud when taken away from their combination. To see a beautiful flesh tone against brilliant sand and to be able to recognize that a piece of mud color from the palette put against a brilliant yellow on the canvas will give the illusion of flesh on the beach - that takes an understanding which comes as a result of study."
  
  
•  "Make background and figures represent the same kind of day - think of your work as the portrait of a day rather than of a model."
  

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Hawthorne on Painting" by Charles Webster Hawthorne.)