BLOG - I'm
John
Tillotson. I retired at 70 at the beginning of 2011 and like to
think of myself as a
serious amateur oil painter. I
re-started to paint in late 2008 after a gap of nearly 20
years - caused by
working in a small business, which requires 100% commitment.
The purpose of this website is to show my pictures to those interested
- and I hope to encourage others to have a go - whether oil
paints, acrylics, watercolours or whatever.
Late in 2008 I
bought some paints and brushes etc.
- got them out one dark winter's evening in poor electric light and
wondered what on earth I should try and paint. As it was so long
since
I had touched a brush I didn't know if I was wasting time and
money. Do you aim at a style? How do you balance light and dark
and
colour? Rightly or wrongly I always felt it was best not
to read a book on it,
or go on a
course, at least until I felt I had done enough to read with some
understanding.
We were in our old holiday house in Normandy, France and I basically
just tried to paint a version of what was in front of me - not really
trying to paint a picture, but just seeing if I could get
any kind of control. I tried two such pictures, over several
evenings and I did more work on each after I got home to
England.
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There
are no photos for these originals - painted from life. I think these
look better on the screen than in real life - while the opposite is
true of many of the others. |
painting
1 - at lesl
Perchettes |
painting 2 - at les
Perchettes
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Click on
the thumbnail picture
to see the enlarged
painting
In Windows
Ctrl- (ctrl and minus)
reduces image size on screen (some versions) |
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I use a digital
camera to
take a picture to paint - I know some painters are snooty about
that; it
seems very
practical to me. You can work from the laptop screen, or a printout.
Also,
there are various packages that will help you produce a version with a
grid superimposed - I use Corel Paint Shop Pro.
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Next,
early 2009, my daughter-in-law Alison, and her husband (my
son) Steve. Both pictures were started from my laptop screen at our
house at les Perchettes, a hamlet which is part of the area around
Cuves, a village in Lower Normandy.
photo
3 -
Ali
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photo
4 - Steve
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Click on the thumbnail picture
to see the enlarged painting |
PAINTS
- I have used Winsor and Newton Alkyd paints for these early paintings.
I presently use only 5 colours, including white, mixed to make others
as
required (details
with the paintings). Alkyd paints are good because the paint is dry the
next
morning so you can go on working. The downside is that any paint left
over on your pallette (I
use paper pallettes) is
also dry, so you may have to
remix delicate shades. Some put their pallette in the fridge overnight
- for me, it doesn't seem to work very well. And you can get some very
interesting bacon.
BRUSHES
- At this stage I only used Winsor and Newton's Kolinsky
sable
brushes size 0, mostly intended for watercolours. I suspect most
painters
would say they are far too small for oils. They are quite expensive,
but have
a beautiful feel to them, and a very sharp point, which you need
especially for painting faces, which may only be 1 inch square, or much
less,
on
the canvas. The bigger brushes you see in photos of artists studios
seem to me more suited to decorating the bathroom ceiling than painting
pictures.
Later, I discovered W&N make a size 000 which almost needs a
magnifying glass to see. But I found them very helpful with painting
faces. You need infinite patience and determination to get a good
likeness!
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I know hese
paintings aren't
fantastic, but they aren't useless either -
I hope they will encourage others to have a go too!
I'm pleased to paint at this level.
But I fully accept that when I have shuffled off this mortal coil
they will either go in the dustbin or on a bonfire! |
Next,
three paintings of much the same scene at different times of the
year at a farm called La Jamblerie, in Cuves. To get there
from our French house ... go to the end
of the
lane. Turn left then immediately right ... in a mile or so there is a
crossroads. Turn left towards the village of Cuves (French for Vats!).
In a few hundred metres you are there. |
photo
5 - late spring
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photo 6 - autumn
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photo
7 - winter
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Afghanistan
Here you can see
the
military digital movie camera, and some small arms.
Also, what I take to be some obscenities on the wall, presumably in
Pashtoon, politely requesting the allies to go home.
The plastic water bottle in the painting, on the bed, is not present on
the
photo.
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At
the time of writing this my son-in-law Mark
(daughter Penny's husband) is a Sergeant commando in the
Royal Marines. He came back from Afghanistan and brought three things
with him:
1) no injuries
2) a Lee Enfield rifle, bought from a local trader in Camp
Bastion, as a
present
for me, made in Enfield,
north London, in 1871. It had thus
almost returned to its origins
after 140 years or so (we live about 30 miles
from the old arms factory);
a
remarkable coincidence. And
3) a wonderful photo of Mark (on the right below) and his Sergeant
colleague
Bas in
their fortified, dingy quarters.
On the original photograph you
can
just read
the name of the book on the bed - "The Great Game" by Peter Hopkirk,
which recounts the
history of the British in that part of the world.
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photo 8
- The Great Game |
Now
four very different
pictures :
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photo
9 - snow
at
La
Lande, Cuves
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photo
10 - my friend
Ken Rose on Long Island |
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 photo
11 - wayside stop - Tarras, South Island, N Zealand
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 a
photo
12
- view from Penny and Mark's house in south Devon
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COMPOSITION
- It's only early in 2011 that I read a book on composition. I'm not
sure
what to conclude from my readings. Rightly or wrongly I've always taken
the view that English spoken with a foreign accent can be very
charming; so what I aim to paint is a photo which I hope has a charming
foreign accent. Others must judge! In other words I look at something
and think: that looks nice, let's have a go painting it. No matter what
the rules of composition say. Virtually all
of these pictures, big or small took about 30 - 40 hours each.
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FAILURE
- I often sit doing a painting and find myself saying, "Idiot: you have
no business to be doing this. It's rubbish. There is no chance you will
get any kind of result." And then I think: "Well, if I go on at least I
should have learned something about how to get it righter next time."
So I go on.
Sometimes my wife says that what I'm doing is poor. And the answer is:
"This is my laboratory. And I'm doing an experiment." There is a lot of
truth in this. I politely ask her to go away.
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photo 13
- cousin Terese
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photo 14 - fruit bowl
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My
dear cousin Terese, after lunch, in a
pub-diner at Newburyport, north
of Boston Mass. It was after doing this that made me look for smaller
brushes, which led me to the size 000 brushes.
The bowl of fruit is a standard subject,
and this picture went through
many versions before it was "finished". Some earlier versions were
better
than this. |
Children
The first is principally of 5 year old grandaughter
Katie and her
mother (my daughter) Sue, with little Harry tucked in the bottom
right-hand corner.
This is in our house at Cuves.
The other is my sister-in-law's grandaughter Emily. When Emily's gran
showed me the photo I was very uncom-
fortable at tackling a wood - all
those trees, shadows and sunlight. But I treated it all quite loosely,
with more
detail in the figure.
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photo 15
- Katie,
Sue and
Harry |
photo 16
-
Emily
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PAINTS
- Reading
on the web led me to buy some Michael Harding paints - same range of
colours as
for W&N. The W&N are great, but I found two problems. Probably
due to my ignorance. One is that some colour values seemed to change as
they dried; only a little, but importantly; especially the red. W&N
is a highly
respectable company and are as concerned as anyone to provide good
products. But it seemed worth trying another brand. The other problem -
and I am embarrased to mention it - was that paint on a picture
sometimes seemed to move overnight. Just a little, but enough to be
important in a face. I have never seen reference to this elsewhere, and
feel it must be due to my lack of knowledge. But it has happened enough
times to believe it. I think it's surface tension. Or divine
intervention.
The impression I get is that Michael Harding colours are very rich.
They hold a phenominal amount of pigment; but
to some extent they exhibit the problems mentioned above. But also -
when
you have left a painting for some time and come to put a glaze on a
well dried
area the glaze can sit on the surface like water on a sheet of glass -
in little globules. I'm sure this wouldn't happen to a real artist.
There is a rule in oil painting called "fat over lean" which says that
a painting is less likely to crack if each layer you apply is more oily
than the last. I try to do this, but find it hard in practice
especially when I
need to make corrections, which is frequent.
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BOOKS
- Around the time of painting these latter pictures I was finding more
material on the web and in books that felt useful. Juliette Aristedes's
beautiful book "Classical Painting Atelier" is about methods for
painting classical
pictures. She talks eloquently and at great length and depth about the
methods of the classical masters and how they can
be used today. There are many contemporary classical-style pictures in
her book. I feel they are unreservedly brilliant, but - although many
have a have a real tension, or a cheeky factor they often seem
over-perfect. She talks at length about composition. There are so many
compositional methods that I feel any pound of pork sausages on the
butcher's slab would fit one of them. It's still a really great
book! There are some very adventurous modern pictures in there.
And there is another book, by another American, Gregg Kreutz: "Problem
solving for painters". I'm not sure if it solves problems
for me - probably too advanced. But it is a lovely book and it has many
paintings by the author that I like very much. To my eye his style
seems to
stand between the classical school and something more modern. It's very
attractive.
WEBSITE
- DANNY VAN RYSWYK - There's a really good website by a
professional Dutch
painter, Danny van Ryswyk. In his blog "Studio Secrets" he includes
age-old traditional
formulae for the various mixtures used to prepare canvasses, and the
like, as used by the Old Masters. If you are into painting it is well
worth a visit. He suggests,
for example, a range of modern backings for paintings other than
canvas, eg marine quality
board, and tells you how to prepare them. This lets you, for example,
buy a lovely old, nicely worn, frame in a charity shop or ebay with a
faded
picture, which may be
a non-standard size, throw the
picture away and use the board you have cut to size for your next
painting. Sometimes old frames have great charm. *click here
to visit Danny's website*
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photo 17
-
fruit pan
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photo
18 - my kitchen
table
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photo 19
- vase
and
flowers
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Three pictures inspired by Gregg Kreutz's book.
I was brought up to believe it is a sin to copy. Hm... Number 17 isn't
intended to be a straight copy, but it is based on GK's excellent
example. I tried to make this look, say, 100 years older than the
one in the book.
Much the same for no. 19 without the ageing.
The kitchen table was intended to be in the vaguely Victorian style of
one of Gregg's paintings, but something took over and another style
emerged.
His book is open on the table. |
The Lady with the Lamp
Early in 2011 I had the great privilege to visit Mexico, and in
particular the beautiful and excentric Hotel El Fuerte (the
Fort Hotel) in the town of El Fuerte in the north west.
(The panel at the head of this website is a squashed photo of a display
cabinet, taken in the
hotel.)
On the wall hung a dozen or so old-style clear glass light bulbs, each
hanging from its own nail on a piece of wire, which
had the filaments, internal wires and external contacts removed. Each
had been half-filled with water and had small plants growing in them!
I liked the idea very much. The lady in the hotel was delighted I liked them and
said, "It was
my idea!". I suggested that I could perhaps do a little painting of
them for
her - and went round looking for other things to go in the picture.
There was a photo of her in a frame.....
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photo 20 - the
two together
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I have painted the picture so
that the source of light appears
to come from the roots of the plants in the bulb.
Also, I have changed the photo in the frame to face left, instead of
right, (as it appears in the thumbnail). And given the charming
lady a few
years back.
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OLD PICTURES
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click here
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One
idea that I find fascinating, for no very deep reason, is that common
sense says that a painting cannot hurt your eyes by the intensity of
the light it reflects or "emits". I found an old watercolour the other
day,
done 20 plus years ago, monochrome - burnt umber, I think, where the
sunlight, coming through a doorway, is
reflected off a polished brass table. That comes close to hurting your
eyes. |
- but I think the light coming from the roots of the plants in the
light
bulbs has a similar effect.
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ABSTRACTS
- I don't believe in abstracts. A lot of total twaddle is
written about them:
"....captures the quintessential microcosm of the
infinite...." or
"...profundity without depth..."
That's more
like it. The truth is that abstracts are coloured doodles.
Many years ago I remember having a theory that any scribble could be
classed an abstract. And I had a go at proving it. I managed to
find some ... click here :
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And here are three deeply profound abstracts I've
tried in the last year or two. My family are very rude about them. |
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the end
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