ABSTRACTING the LANDSCAPE w/ CHRISTOPHER VOLPE
ABSTRACTING the LANDSCAPE
w/ CHRISTOPHER VOLPE
8 Week painitng workshop
Todd Bonita Gallery. 39 Ceres St. Portsmouth, NH
April 07 - May 26, 2022. (6 - 9pm) Thursdays
$360 (Limit 12)
Register: (603) 819-9100 or tmbonita@gmail.com
(* You may also like: VOLPE'S "WHAT IF?" Painintg workshop day time class).
ABSTRACTING THE LANDSCAPE
Loosen your brush and let go of perfection! This workshop approaches representational landscape painting through the spirit of abstraction, with the aim of invoking fresh revelations of the familiar. Participants will explore a variety of techniques and practices for bypassing literal rendering in favor of intuitive responses, imaginative ideas, freely adapted rules, and reinvented tools and materials. Throughout, we will rethink perception as a subjective act and therefore fair game for the mind and imagination as well as the eye.
REGISTER: Call Todd (603) 819-9100 or tmbonita@gmail.com
* Credit Card (Call)
* Pay Pal to Tmbonita@gmail.com
* Venmo @Todd-bonita
* Checks made out to "Todd Bonita" mail to my house: 28 McShane Ave, Greenland, NH 03840 (Write, "Volpe ABSTRACTING" in the memo)
* Cash for teachers pet.
PARKING:
(Feel free to drop your gear and hand-off at the gallery, park your car and walk over hands free).
* Metered parking available.
* Hanover St. Garage 2 blocks away.
w/ CHRISTOPHER VOLPE
8 Week painitng workshop
Todd Bonita Gallery. 39 Ceres St. Portsmouth, NH
April 07 - May 26, 2022. (6 - 9pm) Thursdays
$360 (Limit 12)
Register: (603) 819-9100 or tmbonita@gmail.com
(* You may also like: VOLPE'S "WHAT IF?" Painintg workshop day time class).
ABSTRACTING THE LANDSCAPE
Loosen your brush and let go of perfection! This workshop approaches representational landscape painting through the spirit of abstraction, with the aim of invoking fresh revelations of the familiar. Participants will explore a variety of techniques and practices for bypassing literal rendering in favor of intuitive responses, imaginative ideas, freely adapted rules, and reinvented tools and materials. Throughout, we will rethink perception as a subjective act and therefore fair game for the mind and imagination as well as the eye.
REGISTER: Call Todd (603) 819-9100 or tmbonita@gmail.com
* Credit Card (Call)
* Pay Pal to Tmbonita@gmail.com
* Venmo @Todd-bonita
* Checks made out to "Todd Bonita" mail to my house: 28 McShane Ave, Greenland, NH 03840 (Write, "Volpe ABSTRACTING" in the memo)
* Cash for teachers pet.
PARKING:
(Feel free to drop your gear and hand-off at the gallery, park your car and walk over hands free).
* Metered parking available.
* Hanover St. Garage 2 blocks away.
MATERIALS LIST
MATERIALS:
Supports
• Bring at least one medium-sized (e.g. 8×10) canvas or canvas panel per painting session. Cheap stretched canvas or canvas panels from any art supply store will do.
Easel
• You need an easel to hold your painting, either some kind of standup easel or a tabletop if you want to paint sitting down.
Brushes & Knives
You need this knife if you want to try painting in my style, but it’s not necessary for what I want to teach you
• Palette Knife: I often use a combination of “chip” brushes (cheap hardware store brushes – see below) and palette knife in my work. You need a palette knife for mixing paint in any case, but I use a long straight knife with a square edge that blick.com calls a “painting knife.” This knife is key to painting in my style if that’s your interest. It’s the only thing the local stores don’t stock; you can order it from dickblick.com (blue comfort grip 03103-1081 – style “081”) If you need, I’ll lend you one until you get your own – just let me know before we meet!
• Oil Painting Brushes: The main thing here is that your brushes are stiff ones, not too soft and not all small. It’s good to have several kinds of tips too, including a rounded “filbert” style and a straight-edge “flat” style brush. Synthetic bristle is fine as long as it’s stiff.
• You also need a couple “chip” brushes: again, these are cheap hardware store brushes that keep you from getting too “fussy.” The smaller ones (.5 – 2.5 inches) are what we’re after.
• Palette: wood, for mixing your oil colors. Rub olive oil or other vegetable oil into it before you first use it.
Paint
• Titanium White (large tube)
• Permanent Alizarin Crimson (red) small tube
• Yellow Ochre small tube
• Cadmium Yellow Light or Pale (for occasional use SPARINGLY!) – NOT “HUE” small tube
• Ultramarine Blue (French Ultramarine Blue is the same thing) small tube
• Burnt Umber small tube
Clean-Up
• Solvent Free: Since I mostly paint my abstract work with the painting (palette) knife, which wipes clean, the only real cleanup is for the palette. If you want a completely solvent-free system, try plant-based oils (walnut oil, linseed or cooking-grade safflower oil) to clean your palette (works on your hands too).
• Cleaning Solvent: If you don’t care, for years I have been cleaning my brushes and palette with either Gamblin’s Gamsol or Mona Lisa Odorless Mineral Spirits (aka paint thinner).
Paper Towels/Rags (I strongly recommend you get these blue “shop towels,” the hardware store version of paper towels. They’re more absorbent, more durable).
Medium
Painters mix various mediums into their paint to change its consistency and drying time for various reasons you may learn about later. I paint mostly directly and in layers wet on wet using no medium at all. Once you figure out what kind of painter you are, you’ll discover the uses of mediums to create different effects in different kinds of work. If you like, bring some to experiment with - linseed oil to thin y Liquin or Galkyd, or thickened linseed oil (known as stand oil), which makes oil paint more syrupy and gives it gloss. I do have a favorite medium I make with 70% stand oil, 25% regular refined linseed oil, %5 artist-grade turpentine, and 5-10 drops of cobalt drier – but I don’t always use it by any means.
Wear old clothes or bring a smock or an apron! If we’re painting outside, I highly recommend rugged shoes, sunscreen, bug spray, some water and a wide-brimmed hat. our paints, a drying medium to speed drying time, such as
CHRISTOPHER VOLPE
ChristopherVolpe.com
Art is just an attempt to create meaning, both in your own individual life and in the lives of the people you connect with. That’s something I’ve been trying to do as long as I can remember. What keeps me coming back to the easel is a perpetual unrest and an urge to be part of collective search for meaning and satisfaction. It’s the same impulse I had as a teacher of literature – an attempt to make some sense of what’s going on and figure out what’s important before we die.
The paintings I love and aspire to create turn the pain and confusion of being human into a kind of beauty that doesn’t deny the darkness or sugarcoat reality yet insists on a lyrical engagement, not just with the world around us, but with the deeper mysteries of the human heart.
Art is just an attempt to create meaning, both in your own individual life and in the lives of the people you connect with. That’s something I’ve been trying to do as long as I can remember. What keeps me coming back to the easel is a perpetual unrest and an urge to be part of collective search for meaning and satisfaction. It’s the same impulse I had as a teacher of literature – an attempt to make some sense of what’s going on and figure out what’s important before we die.
The paintings I love and aspire to create turn the pain and confusion of being human into a kind of beauty that doesn’t deny the darkness or sugarcoat reality yet insists on a lyrical engagement, not just with the world around us, but with the deeper mysteries of the human heart.