Michael Klein Workshop Day 3

100 Garden & Flower Oil Paintings - 31/100

Day 3 of Michael Klein's workshop was spent on one still life.  Because this was not enough time to complete one, I chose to focus in on the main gladiola bloom and lightly block in the rest of the flowers. 
His palette includes:  Titanium white, Raw sienna light, Yellow ochre pale, Cad yellow pale, Cad orange, Cad red deep, Burnt sienna, Alizaron crimson, Raw umber, Burnt umber, Cobalt blue, Ultramarine, blue, Ivory black, Cobalt violet and Viridian green.  This is a much different palette than I'm used to, making it a great challenge.  Many of these colors I'd never used; he uses Cobalt violet only for mixing, not for flower colors.

Here's a picture of most of the workshop.  Michael, center, has a show at Arcadia Gallery. 

One evening we went to the Broadway show Jersey Boys.  The show, recommended by blogger friend Carol Schiff, was wonderful.  I lived in New Jersey from 1964 - 1970 so I knew every song they sang!

Michael Klein's Painting Workshop Day 2

On the 2nd day of Michael Klein's workshop, we watched him demo for about 2 hours and then either started on a new still life, or worked on an individual flower.  I chose to work on the yellow rose on the left.  During the lunch break, the still life fell over, so I restarted and worked on the rose on the right.  It ended up being a lucky fall, as I learned from restarting.  Michael completes an entire flower, then moves on to another entire flower, throughout the still life.  That way, he doesn't have to worry about a flower wilting.  I usually paint all my darks throughout the whole canvas, then go to lights, always working through the whole canvas.  I do have to worry about flowers wilting, they don't last, so I find myself painting quickly.  Michael paints slowly.   Like Richard Schmid, he doesn't repaint an area, or make lots of color passes. He studies the color, and puts it down once.  This really got me thinking...am I wasting time, paint, energy.

Several of you asked to see my sister's painting; this is her piece from Day 1.  My sister, Natalie Italiano, is an instructor at Studio Incamminati in Philadelpia.

 This is a very small corner of the cast studio at Grand Central Academy.   They have an amazing collection of casts which are used by the full time students.

After class we went to Vasari Classic Oil Color store and distribution center.  Here's Gale showing us how some of their classic paints can be mixed.  It was so great to see this.  I treated myself to some Sap Green, as green was their featured color on sale this month.

The Met and Michael Klein

I am in New Jersey visiting my sister.  When our now grown children were young, we would all spend a week or two together each summer doing fun kid related vacations.  Now, my sister and I still spend the time together, but we plan painting related vacations.  We just got back from 4 days in New York City.  She wanted to take Michael Klein's "Flower Painting" workshop, at Grand Central Academy of Art, so, I took it also.

Our first day in NYC we spent at the Met.  I couldn't get over how many people of all ages were there!  How wonderful that so much of humanity is interested in art!  Inside, the museum didn't seem crowded, but when we came out there were lots of people sitting on the steps enjoying the sidewalk musicians.  I asked at the information booth what the attendance for that day was:  20,000!!

The next 3 days were spent in the workshop. This is my day 1 piece, (I was not able to finish).  Michael is a realistic artist whose approach to painting is based on a strong theoretical and scientific study of  form and nature.  My background is based on observation and color.  It was great to see another approach and to step outside of my personal comfort zone.  I find that makes me think, learn, and grow.  He talked a lot about form;  the form of each individual flower as well as the form of the overall still life.

I have not finished posting my Alaska plein air pieces, yet.  I'll get back to those soon.