Do you know how to get better at painting? Do you have a confident grasp on how to really move the needle on improving your own skills?
I don't know the ultimate answer, but I can share what I'm doing for myself to improve my outdoor painting. I've heard all the standard pieces of advice on how to learn and get better. They usually involve platitudes about lots of practicing, studying, observing, and accepting mistakes. I find all this unsatisfying. I need a more structured approach.
I have a lot of training and experience with figurative and studio painting. I've also gathered a good amount of plein-air painting experience living in San Diego for a number of years and joining the local outdoor painting group. During that time, I just dove in. When it was time for a plein-air painting meetup, I grabbed the materials I needed, and just went at it.
This approach had mixed results. I made some paintings I really liked, and I had many flops. The thing that became a drag on the experience was knowing I was not following a very structured approach to executing my outdoor work.
It is only now that I can see how unstructured I was. At the time I might have told you and convinced myself I was being systematic. I might have said to you "I'm being totally systematic. I start on a pre-toned board and get a basic drawing in place first with a dark umber or sienna, then setting up basic color areas with big washes of a thinned color, then with that setup...I hone in on specific features and elements of the scene...mixing color against my initial washes." It still felt frustrating. I now know that this mental framework was not robust enough to really push my skill forward, and I was not satisfied with the work.
There's no sense in remaining frustrated, and it's no fun to just keep going out and getting your butt kicked by nature. It's a pain to haul all your stuff out to a location, apply the flurry of activity and effort, painting for a couple of hours, and feel like it's all not working and just a mess.
Extending my analogy of plein-air painting being like the street-fighting of painting, I got beaten up by nature a lot. I can keep doing that or put some time in the smelly gym and work on my moves.
So this is a bit of an intro to my approach and setup for what I will be developing in successive posts.
To bring in a new analogy I'm treating this phase of painting as overhauling the engine on a car. I'm pulling apart the things I know and understand, or I think I know, and examining them. I'm figuring out and documenting what I think is really important. Hopefully by doing this, and putting it all back together will help me move the needle and result more enjoyment and better work.
So this is what I will be doing in successive posts. Taking one element of plein-air painting at a time, pulling it apart and recording what I think is essential and important.