Why I Love Copying

Isn’t it a shame that more people don’t see why I love copying? It’s true! Copying another person’s painting may seem downright wrong. Don’t you think? But wait, before I elaborate, I will share this blog and post’s purpose and welcome new reader’s too!

Small Spaces Special Places

Welcome new readers! Each year, I select a theme for my weekly paintings. This year’s is “Small Spaces Special Places.” Why? I have been surprised, even delighted, with the small spaces in our house that have captured my eye.

Also, there are the special places I see on my daily dog walks. Each morning, rain or shine, I love getting outdoors and looking for things to paint. Sometimes, we venture on the road and I share paintings of special places from these trips, too.

If you or someone you know will enjoy a weekly dose of color, sign up here for this weekly blog. Let’s get to this week’s topic of – gasp – copying!

This week’s Master to copy

A couple of week’s ago, I wrote about a landscape painter I had never heard of named Willem Bastiaan Tholen. This week, the adoration continues. Why? I am smitten with the way this painter breaks rules. What rules you may ask? Nothing naughty or nefarious, just painting composition rules.

This all started when I decided to study and share information about composition, one tip a day Monday through Friday, for 100 days starting in May of this year via Instagram. There are so many rules and recommendations in composition. And, I thought it would be fun, even educational, to study this topic and share it. I also am sharing composition tips for collectors although not as frequently as tips for artists.

Enter copying someone else’s painting! As a painter, I want to absorb as much information about this topic as possible. And, what better way to do that then to paint someone else’s painting. Right?

Part of the Why

So there’s part or a start of the reason why I love to copy paintings. I get to look at beautiful paintings throughout history. Then when I see one that takes my breath away, copy it. This, to me, is such a better way to study art history then the slide show lectures I sat through…er…snoozed through in college. (Shhh don’t tell anyone). Ha!

But that’s not the end game. Ultimately, I am seeking to find the underpinnings or structure of wonderful paintings others have done so that I can do my own. To clarify, I mean I paint my own original painting using what I have learned from the paintings I have copied.

Why Tholen

You may wonder why Tholen? Part of this answer is subjective: I love his paintings! But, in the time that I have been sharing tips on Composition, I have noticed something unique about Tholen. He loves breaking composition rules. For instance, there’s a composition rule that a painter ought never place a straight line near the edge of a painting. Ever!

Check out this painting by Tholen and his overt breaking of that rule in a beautiful way.

Do you see how he gets our eyes to move throughout the composition? And, he breaks another rule by having the horizon line practically smack dab in the middle of the painting. But the subtle clouds lure your eye up. Then you can follow the edge of the tree next to the right hand column. My eye follows that to the water, then to the trees in the near distance. Does your eye do that too?

Another Tholen Master Painting

Here’s another painting by Tholen where he commits the same crime. See those trees? They are so close to the edge. In fact, the tree on the left is partially cut off of the canvas.

But this painting is so alluring and just feels as if we (the viewer) are experiencing a moment in the interior of a lovely forest. I studied this painting by doing several Notan studies. Recall that Notan studies are a shape and pattern defining tool. And, there is something constructive about taking a look at a painting at it’s most fundamental level: in black and white.

You don’t have to do this with pen or pencil and paper. Rather, you can take a photo of your favorite painting and then use the ‘convert to black and white’ option in the camera on your phone. This is the ‘easy button’ version of doing Notan. But even looking at the black and white values of a painting helps to simplify and see where your eye goes in the painting, if anywhere.

Next Steps

I can see copying the compositions of other paintings in history as a long term learning tool. In fact, I have started off the past few weeks doing just that. The challenge is creating effective, rule-breaking compositions of my own. And, since it always helps to have a Plan B in place, I will continue to create paintings using the composition rules I am learning and sharing along the way. In fact, I foresee this as a sensible plan going forward. Why? Well, there’s such value in getting total clarity and understanding of the rules. Then, breaking them. Don’t you think?

What Rules Do You Break

What about you, gentle reader, are there rules that you have learned and now break with style and panache? If so, please do share in the comments below and thank you for reading today!