Sketchbook_Confidential
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George Allen Durkee
A longtime painter of San Francisco's cityscapes, Durkee sought new artistic stomping grounds when he headed for Northern California nearly a decade ago and switched his focus to landscapes. “I read somewhere that an artist ought to risk his career about every two years just as a way of keeping his work fresh,” he has explained. “Well, it was time. I was hungry for a new challenge.” A contributing writer for THE ARTIST'S MAGAZINE and AMERICAN ARTIST, Durkee is also the author of
EXPRESSIVE OIL PAINTING: AN OPEN AIR APPROACH TO CREATIVE LANDSCAPES.
I draw by fits and starts, sometimes not for a week or more at a time. Then again, I may spend whole days moving from one location to another, returning home with a pile of new drawings.
I use sketches to think about ideas for paintings. Thumbnail sketches are an enormous help when planning a composition. My sketches are the beginning stages of my paintings, in simplified form. The structure needs to be there from the beginning. The more I know about my landscape subject, the more liberties I can take when painting it.
A sketch is a way to feel my way into a composition, capturing the light and shadows before the sun arches across the sky and everything shifts. It works out best for me to draw during the same time of day that I plan to paint the subject so I can study the light and see how it's going to change over a period of time.
Vision is such a common human experience that we may think that because we look, we see. To draw, you have to see in the artist's specialized way. Half of drawing is seeing. When I draw I ask,“What's most important in this landscape? How will I relate it to the rest of the composition so it gets the most attention?” I think about lines and angles; how big is this shape compared to that one? How dark? How light?
Drawing keeps me humble because it is almost never easy. If I want to draw well, I need to pay attention to what I'm doing. Drawing helps me cultivate a quiet mind.
I try to get into a relaxed state when drawing and detach from whether I'm drawing well or not. Sometimes I may need to remind myself that it's just paper. There's less time and effort invested in a drawing or sketch, so you can experiment and take risks to see how an idea works. Doesn't work? Turn the page and try again. It's okay to take a few risks just to see what might happen.
The more I know about my landscape subject, the more liberties I can take when painting it.
For me, drawing requires mindfulness and inner silence. However, some of the artists in our figure drawing group like to talk and draw at the same time. This drives me nuts! And more so since they draw so well! I would enjoy the community drawing experience more if the loudest voice in the room was a cacophony of pencil strokes, but clearly, my way is not the only way.
Drawing is hard for me. I've been drawing for fifty years and I still struggle. When I draw a lot, I become more fluent, but then it begins to slip away. I should draw more.
Douglas Fryer
Fryer developed his love of landscape while living in rural Vermont, California and presently in the farmland and mountains of central Utah. He paints primarily in oils but enjoys watercolor, printmaking and digital mediums as well. Fryer has taught fine art and illustration at several universities and art schools, including his alma mater, Brigham Young University, and the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, and he has illustrated for numerous clients in publishing and advertising. His works are of places, objects and people “that have been significant to me.”
