Seeing the Big Picture - III

B.R. Cohn Vineyard, east of Glen Ellen • © 2010 Karen Lynn Ingalls

I said in the last post on this subject (for both previous posts, see Seeing the Big Picture - I and Seeing the Big Picture - II) that there are two simple things that will help you see the big picture. (Only two? Nyaaah... humor me here....) The first is making thumbnail sketches.

The second simple thing that will help you see the big picture is squinting.

Huh?

Squinting reduces the amount of light entering the eye, and allows us to see things more in terms of value (lightness and darkness) than color. It allows us to mimic night vision, in a way. At night, our ability to see color is limited, so we see objects as variations of light or dark.

B.R. Cohn Vineyard, east of Glen Ellen • © 2010 Karen Lynn Ingalls

Without getting too technical, it has to do with the rods and cones in our eyes, which determine how we see (you can find a scientific explanation of them at The Rochester Institute of Technology Center for Imaging Science, or a more easily understandable explanation at the University of Washington's Neuroscience for Kids - obviously very smart kids).

So squinting helps us see large areas of similar values. If you squint at the photographs above, in this post, where are the light patches? Where are the dark patches?

Arrangement in grey and black No. 1, the mother of the artist

James McNeill Whistler, 1871

If you squint at Whistler's Mother, where are the light patches? Where are the dark patches? Where are the middle values? (Whistler has done a lot of the hard work for you here.)

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone • Thomas Moran, 1893 - 1901

If you squint at this small image of Thomas Moran's The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, where are the light patches? Where are the dark patches? In this most highly detailed painting (you can see a larger version of it here), can you see the bigger picture?

Thomas Moran, like Albert Bierstadt a painter of monumental scenes of the American West (this canvas is 8' x 14' in size), was able to incorporate lots of splendid details into this enormous canvas, but it wouldn't work unless he was very clear about the big shapes – about the big picture.

Squinting allows us to simplify the big shapes in whatever we are looking at – the land before us, a still life setup, a model, a photograph image, a painting – and see them clearly. Use it! Often! It works! (And try it out on those thumbnails....)

More on painting with Jerry Fresia

In a short two-minute YouTube video that I think you will enjoy, On Painting, painter Jerry Fresia talks a little more about how he paints.

"When I look at something," Fresia says, "I do not see houses or boats or water. I see color – the colors of my palette. I see the world through those colors. I squint to simplify, and look at relationships...."

It's a concept that can be a little difficult to understand when you are first beginning painting. As the camera pans the surface of a painterly image of a boat, he tells us, "This is not a boat… it's purple and pink and green and blue."

If this is new to you, try it out. Look at something nearby – can you see it as color and shape, instead of as a specific object? Try it a few times, looking at different things. If you're having a hard time with it, try looking at something upside down. Do you suddenly see colors you didn't notice before? This is a critical skill for a painter to develop.

He is very clear about the necessity of suspending judgement as you paint. If that critical voice in your head starts talking to you, send it out for coffee – it won't help you create. As he says, "This is not about results – it's not about objects. It's about brush strokes, the human touch of paint upon canvas."

Jerry Fresia's other YouTube videos are well worth looking at, too. When you view this video, you will see them listed under More From FresiaStudios. His home and studio, and their Lake Como setting, are incredibly beautiful. He teaches workshops there, too. You can find out more about him, his paintings, his studio, and his workshops at www.fresia.com.