For the Love of Impressionism
Over the years, I’ve been exposed to many different art styles, each of which has impacted my artistic vision in a different way. Out of all of those styles, impressionism has become my favorite. From Alfred Sisley, to Camille Pissarro, to (of course) Claude Monet, each impressionist provides a window into their artistic interpretation of the scenes they paint, without the constraints of precision and reality imposed in other art styles. Even though this style may seem like it it takes little effort to put some roughly defined shapes onto the drawing/painting surface, it actually requires an incredible amount of skill and patience to pull off correctly.
While my engineering brain pushes me to create art which most exactly represents reality (as you may see in some of my artwork), I’m drawn to the impressionism style more and more. To this end, my latest piece is an oil pastel drawing of Scott Dixon’s Ford GT from Sebring in 2017, drawn on 11” x 14” Bristol vellum. This piece was drawn with the intent to capture the reference imagery provided by Rob Woodham, but with an impressionist interpretation.
This is not my first attempt at creating an impressionist artwork. One of my earlier examples is shown to the right. I created this painting of some lobster boats in Portland, ME in 2017 as my first oil painting. What drew me most to painting this scene was the reflections in the water, something that always captivates me when I see similar imagery in classic impressionist masterpieces. Through this painting and subsequent pieces, I’ve started to hone my impressionist style.
Speaking of style, that’s another thing that draws me to impressionism. Compared to realistic drawings and paintings, impressionism provides more flexibility in defining one’s own style. I’ve found that the better my realistic drawings get, the more they look like other artists’ realistic drawings (although, admittedly, not as good.) And if the artwork is realistic enough, why not just have a photograph? Don’t get me wrong, I love and appreciate super realistic artwork. It’s a level of precision and skill that takes decades to perfect, which I admire very much. However, I find that I can be a little more creative and set my artwork apart from others by going down the impressionism path.
As always, I took my time with this one. Starting with a blank sheet of vellum, I sketched out the reference line work in pencil, then applied the color, starting at the top of the image and working downward. Oil pastels behave similarly to oil paint in some ways (it can be tough to overlap some colors, for example), but present other challenges. For example, as the color is applied to the sheet, not all of the pastel material is transferred to the surface, leaving little clumps of color sitting around. If you’re not careful, these can easily smudge on top of already colored areas. The photo to the left shows me filling in the black areas under the car. I had to gently brush the excess pigment off the surface every few minutes to ensure that the black did not smudge over lighter surrounding areas.
I hope you enjoy this new piece, as I plan to draw and paint more impressionist style artwork in the future. Please let me know what you think!
- Tom
