Into The Woods, Deep Woods

Artists look at the same material and create different visions. Artists accompanying me in the Catskills gave different visions but shared similar design structures. We  share design forms just as we share the letters of the alphabet,  similar vocabularies,  and even similar story forms. But our personal stories (paintings) reveal our unique use of that alphabet, vocabulary and story form.

Paul Gala, Kathryn Poch, and Janine Robertson were three of 21 artists joining me in the Catskills. Their works reveal  shared design forms coupled to personal invention. Let’s begin with Paul (examples 1 and 2).  Working within a square format Paul  organizes his plein air experience by relying on the triangle as a foundation.  His palette appears warm because of his use of transparent red oxide (iron oxide). Observe in both examples Paul inclines the outlying tree forms into an off-center triangle. With his waterfall he guides us back and up the steps of the falls.  The falls also assume a triangular shape.  In his woodland painting Paul takes us back through a series of triangles within triangles each varied in size, inclination, and description of edges.

example 1. Paul Gala, Falls, oil. 

example 2. Paul Gala, Woodland Trail, oil.

Janine Robertson (examples 3, 3a, and 4) stacks a triangle of clouds over an echoing triangle shape of trees  which can be seen on the right side of the meadow. She also laterally runs triangles in opposition to one another which you see diagrammed in example 3a. In Janine’s vertical composition she relies on a serpentine trail of spotted lights within a darkened foreground. Notice Janine uses the dark foreground as an effective threshold device to encourage the viewer to move back toward the light.  We step over the dark threshold to get to the light. The serpentine design is simplyl a stack of two opposing triangles, a softened letter “Z” or “S”.  Janine gives us an example of a fundamental application of the zig zag  to invite the viewer in.

example 3. Janine Robertson, sky and meadow, oil on metal.

example 3. diagram of triangles  

example 4. Janine Robertson, Meandering Stream, oil on copper.

All three of these artists used curving or bending triangles to give them more dynamic forms with a greater suggestion of motion.  Kathryn Poch  (examples 5 and 6) uses triangles and circles. She bends her triangles even more severely.  In example 5 Kathryn flattens and foreshortens a circle  into a disc form.  She then places a vertically aspiring collection of shapes in its center. The effects has us feeling a landscape revolve around a motif, all evolving, all in motion. In example 6 Kathryn keeps us spinning as we revolve around a blue copse of trees.  Curvilinear forms suggest motion, a turning motion as well as volume.

example 5. Kathryn Poch, Coral Discovery, oil  on anodized aluminum.

example 6. Kathryn Poch, Wind, oil on anodized aluminum.

I am off to paint and photograph the woods, streams, waterfalls, meadows and White Mountains of New Hampshire in September. September 4th through the 8th. If you wish to join me contact the Silvermine School of Art at  203 966 6668 ext 2.