Artists’ studios can be strange worlds, imaginative, full of intrigue. American artist Andrew Wyeth’s studio boasted armies of little metal soldiers fighting on deep windowsills alongside large colorful glass bottles, while a few swords leaned against the wall and a mat of discarded paintings and sketches lay strewn on the floor. With a few clicks on your computer, you can view Picasso's studio or Cezanne’s. Vermeer’s paintings feature his studio, famous for the window on the left with its cool north light. Rembrandt's studio was austere, with a single easel to hold a canvas as he painted over 100 self-portraits. Monet painted on his famous floating boat studio while living in Argenteuil, and then created his even more famous garden studio in Giverny. InSide the Back Mountain, my students and I work amidst a studio which includes a box overflowing with Boyds Bears, shelves stuffed with building models, an antique clock, several wooden manikins, a coal bucket complete with coal and a small stove coal shovel, and shelves with over a thousand art books. There's a steer’s skull with horns as a tribute to Georgia O’Keefe, two deer skulls as a tribute to local hunters, an antique mounted saltwater striped bass that formerly hung in the bar at Pickett’s Charge Restaurant, a box of seashells and feathers, and a ceiling covered with panels designed by decades of high school seniors who created “their block” before leaving the studio to seek fame and fortune! There are MANY other items for inspiration. However, the studio models I turn to most are the silk flowers.
As a child, I used to gaze out our large front window in January, after the Christmas tree, lights, tinsel, gift wrap and presents were all put away, as snowflakes swirled through the sky. I pretended that each snowflake was preparing a leaf on a tree or a flower for next June's meadows. Perhaps that is why each January I seem to itch to paint flowers! I don’t mean the botanically correct flower portraits I paint from life. I mean flowers loose and free, colors flowing and swirling, perhaps influenced by snowflakes outside. I mean wet into wet watercolor, with paint that swims before it settles down to suggest blossoms and leaves. I mean strokes that merely suggest the subject, not dominate it.
Years ago, on our first trips to Maine, I became enchanted with a gift shop in Northeast Harbor on Mount Desert Island. The iconic Kimball Shop was housed in an ancient, weather-beaten structure that boasted white painted boards outside, fascinating display windows streetside, and wooden floors inside that creaked as shoppers moved through inviting arrangements of classic china and furnishings. Their high quality silk flowers were glorious and each year for many years, I purchased a few more sprigs as summer souvenirs. It's usually on a snowy January evening when a storm seems imminent that my yearning for the flowers of summer hits me the strongest. It hits when every flower in my yard is frozen, dead and buried. It hits after 9 pm when no self-respecting florist InSide the Back Mountain or beyond would ever entertain my passionate plea for live models! That's when I look around the studio, locate the Kimball Shop silk flowers kept in various places, and arrange a few. With my pencil held at arm’s length only by its last inch, I scribe in a few guidelines of graphite on Arches or Fabriano watercolor paper. I usually wet the entire sheet, or at least most of it, before laying in the first wet-into-wet washes. It's a dance of delight! I love watching the paint swirl and mingle. Occasionally, I spatter paint into the washes and watch it dissolve into random patterns. It's a fusion of artist and paint, a walk just on the verge of out-of-control! As the paper slowly dries, I begin to paint smaller, paint slower, and paint more controlled. My students often ask, “How do you know when to stop?” I don't. Not really. So before I think it’s complete, I lay down the brush and walk away. It's a fine line between adventure and disaster! Sometimes I don';t touch the painting for a day or two. Sometimes I don't complete the painting for a month or two! I usually add very little, just a few “tweaks” as we say. Too many details in a loose watercolor is like too much pepper ruining a dish!
On a cold snowy night in January, when swirling snowflakes abound, can we see or imagine flowers through our artist’s eyes? The least we can do is cheer them on!
This article originally appeared in the December 2024 publication of InSide the Back Mountain.