Know it all people ....

“Those who simply collect technique have at best only a second hand lot. A great artist is one who says as nearly what he means as his powers of invention allow. An ordinary artist often uses eloquent phrases, phrases of established authority, and if he is skillful it is surprising to see how he can nearly make them fit his ideas---or how he can make the ideas give way to a phrase. But such an artist is not having a good time. 

A snake without a skin might make a fair job of crawling into another snake's shedding but I guess no snake would be fool enough to bother with it. ...

IF IN your drawings you habitually disregard proportions you become accustomed to the sight of distortion and lose critical ability. A person living in squalor eventually gets used to it.” Robert Henri, The Art Spirit

Not promoting this book just an example

Wow, this an artist after my own brush! I have often been told in my life that those who can do and those who can't stand by and tell you how to. I must admit, that really gets under my skin sometimes. I just hate for someone to say to me "if you did this" and speak in terms that only one can find in what I call 'idiot books'. You know the books I speak of. The ones that convince people (that don't have a clue how to hold a brush must less how to keep the paint from sliding off the canvas) that they can tell you what and how to do. These are the people I want to take my paint brush to. I'd probably paint question marks all over their tiny little beady-eyed faces so when I looked back at them I could simple say, “Question? Why the hen are you here invading my space if you don't like the quality of my air? Crawl back in your own snake skin.” I mean really--gets on my last nerve.

enough said for today ... happy creating ya'll. P.H. Original's aka/Pam Hartfield

If the artist is alive in you .. Robert Henri, The Art Spirit

"IF THE artist is alive in you, you may meet Greco nearer than many people, also Plato, Shakespear, the Greeks. In certain books -- some way in the first few paragraphs you know that you have met a brother.

You Pass people on the street, some are for you, some are not." Robert Henri, The Art Spirit.

El Greco
http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/greco/ 

Plato
http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=7481846318858013482

Shakespeare
http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=7481846318858013482
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.


For my two cents worth today I give you one of my favorite Rat Packers as I could not have said it better myself and this, my friend, is my brother.

I hope to be scared soon :/

531 × 390 - Robert Henri, Girl Seated by the Sea, 1893

16 x 20 - Pam Hartfield, Path to the Sea

 Imagine a world where you sit on top of the Ferris Wheel and never feel the slightest shiver or get the feeling you could fall.  What if you never felt a little eerie entering a haunted house or after you've climbed the mountain not been a little afraid to peek over the edge? Ever peered out at the vastness of the Ocean and wondered what creature looms away from the shoreline, but gasped at the beauty and intrigued by it all?

 In the words of our infamous Robert Henri, "Everybody who has any respect for painting feels scared when he starts a new canvas.  A person who has never been afraid has no imagination.


A GREAT painter will know a great deal about how he did it, but still he will say, "How did I do it?"  The real artist's work is a surprise to himself." Robert Henri, The Art Spirit

I'll buy that! I have yet to touch a new canvas when my hand didn't quiver just a bit. I bite my lip and say a little prayer.  I have even been known to whisper to myself, "It's okay me and God have this."  It's when a painting goes astray and lends itself to some form that has no recollection of realness that I whisper again, "Lord, where did I go wrong?"

I'll leave you with these thoughts to ponder today ...  GET SCARED PEOPLE and paint. (imagine the fear in me when I clicked the button posting Henri's seashore beside mine)

I'm not Famous but I'd Like to be ...

Yes, that's me non-famous Artist Pam Hartfield.  Wonder what it would be like to really be famous?  Never mind being rich!  I could paint until my hearts content, start a school for all those who really want to paint and can't afford to buy the supplies.  The list would be endless.  I can see it now P.H. Original's aka/Pam Hartfield up in lights with cameras flashing and journalist asking questions.  I wonder how many times I would stumble over my own feet walking that red carpet?  We all know I shoot from the hip when I have something to say so I assume they would just love to quote me saying something utterly stupid ... but then again that's part of my charm don't you think? ;)

On to a more serious note about someone who was famous in his own time, Robert Henri.

Robert Henri, Gertrude Venderbilt Whitney, 1916

"A work of art is not a copy of things.  It is inspired by nature but must not be a copying of the surface.  Therefore what is commonly called "finish" may not be finish at all.

You have to make your statement of what is sential to you-an innate reality, not a surface reality.  You handle surface appearances as compositional factors to express a reality that is beyond superficial appearances.  You choose things seen and use them to phrase your statement." Robert Henri/ The Art Spirit

"In other words if you want a picture buy a camera." Pam Hartfield/non-famous artist

It's Me Again

  View from My Studio Window (sigh)

Sorry for not posting lately guys.  I have a close family member with the dreaded Alzheimer's Disease and I am afraid I have been obsessed with that.  What I am coming to realize is that I must live today because tomorrow my life may be taken from me even if I am still walking this earth.  I vow to get back into my blog world and hope there are readers out there that enjoy hearing the things I share.

I have so many things in my head that I want to do.  I have paintings etched in my brain, a book I need to write (I have it started but I hope my laptop doesn't freak out on me) and there's still that Homemade Christmas Thing I talked my family into this year! It has been hard to get started on some of these things since we have been out of town for over a year now. We are scheduled to be back at home around the first of April and I can't wait. My Studio has been beckoning me from afar .... like a light from a lighthouse calling me back to the safe harbor of the world I like to live in.

enough said for today ... happy creating ya'll

Are you finished yet?

Grab My Button look right of the page

One must begin to ever finish. Isn't that the truest statement you ever heard? I suggest you begin at the beginning;the first feeling you felt inspired by.  A look on a persons face, a sunrise, a shadow at midday, an ocean view in all of its magnificence. Remember the feeling upon awaking to the dawn on a new day;you will pull from this feeling to finish your work. 

The feeling is fleeting so you must work swiftly.  I know I am holding my feeling if my cigarette burns in the ashtray.  This means I have set my tone correctly; color values are harmonizing, my brush strokes are precise and I am accomplishing what I set forth to do. I usually listen to music that matches the feeling it helps keep me in that frame of mind.

 "Do some great work, Son!  Don't try to paint good landscapes.  Try to paint canvases that will show how interesting landscape looks to you ... your pleasure in the thing. Wit.

There are lots of people who can make sweet colors, nice tones, nice shapes of landscape, all done in nice broad and intelligent-looking brushwork.

self-portrait-or-desperate-man-gustave-courbet

Courbet showed in every work what a man he was, what a head and heart he had. 

Every student should put down in some form or other his findings. .... What he leaves is so much for others to use as stones to step on or stones to avoid. " Robert Henri - The Art Spirit

( Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet (10 June 1819–31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realist movement in 19th-century French painting. ...) 

Remember this and then enough said for the day. "If you think you can, you can. If you think you can't, you're right." P. Cunard

"Don't Worry About Rejections ..."

Yes, I am back to Robert Henri today and just read a statement from his book using the word "rejections" ... plural "rejections". What a way to start a day huh?

"Don't worry about rejections.  Everybody that's good has gone through it.  Don't let it matter if your works are not "accepted" at once.  The better or more personal you are the less likely they are of acceptance.  Just remember that the object of painting pictures is not simply to get them in exhibitions.  It is all very fine to have your pictures hung, but you are painting for yourself, not for the jury." Robert Henri, The Art Spirit.

I say when you are rejected, "Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience."  Happy painting ya'll.