DVD My Chinese Vision || Herman Pekel

In my review of Herman’s previous film with APV, I described him as a magician. To that, I think I’ll add alchemist. Although this is filmed in China, the city street and beach scenes could be almost anywhere, although a session around (newly built) traditional architecture does give more sense of place. All the sessions are dogged by heat, humidity and a dense haze (which might be smog). It’s clear that working in these conditions is hard labour and Herman does well to keep going and produce what can really only be described as pure gold from base metal.

What makes the film watchable, indeed compelling, is Herman himself. His commentary is continuous – few other artists can manage to work and talk at the same time as well as he does – and includes nuggets of wisdom you’ll want to write down. In the city, where buildings, street furniture and signs abound, he remarks, “The more complex a subject is, the more I tend to use just drybrush”. This combines with advice to “Let the water, pigment and paper do the work for you” to demonstrate ways of simplifying not just the subject, but your technique. He adds later, “You must have a vision, you must see the painting finished before you start.”

The scenes Herman chooses are unpromising and the haze makes things more difficult as details are obscured and distances barely visible. His ability to focus on a small area and to manipulate it into an effective composition is the alchemy I referred to earlier. He also has sound advice, especially in the conditions, to do 90% of the work on location, but to leave the remainder for later (on this occasion in the comfort of an air-conditioned hotel room) when you have had a chance to rethink. Here, outlines are tightened up and further details added that pull everything together.

I’m not sure how much of a flavour of China this presents, apart from the heat and the crowds, and it would be unreasonable to suggest that it was something to look at from that point of view. However, as a lesson on painting in unpromising conditions, and on working on location with watercolour, it’s utterly gripping.

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DVD A Simple Approach in Oils || Roger Dellar

Simplicity is a complicated thing. It takes a lot of skill and experience to learn how to extract the essence of a scene without fiddling, over-working and getting bogged down in unnecessary detail. In the five paintings demonstrated here, Roger works from a basic blocking-out of shapes, a carefully selected palette that reflects the dominant colours and an economy of brushstrokes. His remark, “I’m lazy; I only use a few brushes” is disingenuous – there’s nothing lazy about it and, although he’s not one of those painters who thinks hard before making every mark, each one is deliberately placed. There’s no random working, placing and re-placing. It’s fascinating to see how he works from the general to the specific, with details at first scratched into shapes and blocks before being delineated with colour some time later.

Of the five scenes, three involve water – the other two are in the centres of Chichester and Midhurst. The common factor is that there’s a lot going on – different craft on the water, details, people coming and going or a jumble of buildings. A literal approach, where everything is recorded, would be indigestible, but Roger’s way of building up manages to leave nothing out while at the same time omitting all extraneous matter. That’s what I meant by the complication of simplicity: it’s not just about developing an eye for a picture, but about the means of putting it down on canvas.

It’s also worth noting the palette exposition that starts the film. These are usually a matter of “this is my palette, I put these colours on it”. Roger’s is much more, because he works with such a limited range and he explains here and throughout the film how these are chosen to reflect the scene in front of him. His idea of having two sections of white, one for warm and one for cool colours is a neat one, too. Palette explanations are rarely of more than passing interest, but this is riveting.

After I watched this film, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say about it. I left it overnight. “It has to mature”, I said, and it has. Roger doesn’t instruct, he just explains what he’s doing, so extracting the information is like brewing coffee – it can’t be hurried. I find I have a surprisingly clear memory of almost the whole film and that’s a measure of good explanation – simplicity always leads to comprehension.

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DVD Mixing It Up With Watercolour || Charles Sluga

Charles Sluga is a new name to me, but a look at his website reveals that he both travels and demonstrates extensively. The experience shows in this polished performance which kept me engaged from start to finish.

Stylistically, I want to say that Charles is very much like most of the contemporary Australian artists whose work I’ve seen. Is this unfair? Is there an Australian style or are there just painters who happen to hail from the other side of the world? There does, though, tend to be a spirit of the time, as well as locational influences.

Let me expand: the creative process tends to feed off itself and there have always been schools and styles that can be located both chronologically and in terms of place. It’s not just art, but design, making, music and so on. One person comes up with an idea, another embellishes it and, before you know it, it’s a theme. There’s also the fact that different locations produce different light. Britain has a varied, but often damp and cloudy climate which gives it styles like the Norwich school. Continental America can produce brilliant colours and strong lighting, although the painters of New England (maybe not so inappropriately named) give us work that we, across the Atlantic, can feel more at home with. Australia is, physically, more like America but is mostly populated round the coast. As a result, you tend to get the bright colours, but also more subtle hues. Their artists – or at least those that APV work with – also tend to work in a loose and impressionistic way.

So, back to Charles. At one point, he draws a line that goes from abstraction to hyper-realism: “You can paint anywhere on that”, he tells us although, for this film at least, he’s somewhere between representation and abstraction – recognisable subject, not much detail. His narrative can be summed up in a few quotes: “A painting is a beautiful lie” … “I approach plein air painting as just a study to fool myself and relax” … “It should look like a bit of a mess at the start”… “You don’t want to have to count legs.” What this means is that the subject in front of you is merely the basis for a design and he demonstrates this in the first session, a riverside scene where he rearranges the boats to make the subject stronger. He also indulges in a bit of theatre, showing how to handle a small brush: “break it … throw it away!”

The film is based in London and features five demonstrations starting from the riverside scene in Isleworth, and going via a study of St Pancras station, where massive detail is simplified right down. We then move to Piccadilly Circus, and finish at Greenwich in the east, where he paints the Cutty Sark contre jour as a tonal exercise in darks using Phthalo Blue. The final piece, the gates of the Naval College in flat lighting, is about colour and deliberately ignores both tones and hues. “If you can get the major shapes down without getting caught up in the detail, you’ve got the essence of the painting.”

This is, as I said hugely enjoyable, and also an informative film. Charles is knowledgeable both about his subjects – I didn’t know that the statue in Piccadilly Circus is Anteros, Eros’s brother – and painting and painters in general. He also has the ability to analyse and understand his own working methods, as well as keep up a commentary and paint at the same time. These are rare skills, especially when done this well.

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DVD Essential Watercolour: Boats & Harbours || Paul Weaver

The first few minutes of any instructional film are important. It’s the time when you decide whether you like the style of presentation and, indeed, the presenter themselves. This one starts well, with some neat establishing shots that tell us we’re in Porlock Weir in Somerset and present it as the attractive location it is. You may think that making an art DVD is just a matter of pointing a camera at the demonstrator and recording what they say and do. It isn’t, it’s highly skilled, requiring not just technical expertise to make sure that the exposure is right (nothing’s worse than a painting you can’t see) and that the shots hold details long enough for the viewer to see what’s going on, but change with sufficient frequency to keep the rest of the brain interested. It’s not even enough just to turn the camera on when the painting starts and off when it finishes. Watching an artist from start to finish can be as exciting as watching paint dry and a good editor will know exactly what needs to stay in and what can safely end up on the cutting room floor.

The long-established houses such as APV and Townhouse have the process down pat. They’ve been doing it for years and even have backgrounds in the general industry. Lune Ltd, who make this, are new to me and, when I followed up the website, I was amazed to get to a photo retoucher. Whatever, this is a thoroughly professional production and the people behind it (I assume Paul Weaver is only part of a team) know their stuff. I’ve seen painting films produced by people whose background is more in commercial or wedding photography and they don’t quite get the requirements of art. This is absolutely top quality and even has some neat tricks up its sleeve that don’t grate – editing the superfluous details that Paul is going to leave out of the painting from the video image adds a dimension I haven’t seen before. It must be the retouching background.

Well, here we are, nearly as long as some reviews and I haven’t even mentioned the paintings yet! There’s a reason for that, because I wanted to make the point that I felt well-disposed before we got properly started.

The film itself includes four demonstrations, three on location at Porlock Weir in differing lights and a final one in the studio which allows Paul to spend more time on a sketch he made earlier.

Paul’s main stock in trades are sketching and simplification. He makes the point that, by walking around the subject it and making sketches, you get to understand it – how it’s made up, the form, tone and perspective. Even in the studio, he prefers to work from a sketch rather than a photograph due to the personal element the former brings. Once you’re familiar with the area, the initial question of what to paint should make itself apparent and the next step is to decide what to include and what to leave out. Boats are rarely neatly arranged and the variety of shapes, angles and ancillaries, such as ropes, add a level of complication that make it difficult for the viewer to interpret the final painting. “Not copying the scene exactly … taking the essence of it.” At the same time, it’s important to keep the work balanced, so some elements may even have to be moved to avoid empty areas. Although Paul seems to have an instinctive ability to do this, he’s also very good at explaining what he’s doing and, above all, why he’s doing it.

I have a final list in my notes where I’ve summed up Paul’s painting process. It says:

Sketch
Simplify
Mood and atmosphere
Enjoy

I don’t think I can do better than reproduce it exactly as I wrote it, because it sums up the message, the presentation and the presenter. This is a thoroughly enjoyable film you’ll want to watch, by a skilled and entertaining presenter.

Available from www.paulweaverart.co.uk

DVD Greg Allen’s Watercolour Techniques

You can’t help but warm to this from the start. “Isn’t watercolour fun?” are Greg’s first words as the introductory scenes roll past. Well, yes, it can be, and it certainly is in the hands of this competent and entertaining demonstrator.

Greg has a clear understanding of the processes of watercolour painting and he also has a way of simplifying them and then explaining them coherently. He begins with his “three effects” theory. Well, it’s more than a theory, as he demonstrates how marks vary depending on how much water you have on wet, damp and dry paper. So far, so fairly conventional, but he goes further and shows how these (and just these) can be used to capture any shape. Lay a wet wash and let it run from heavy to light down the paper. It’s a sky. Turn it on its side, add defining lines and it’s a cylinder, which he rather magically turns into a tree. Back in the day, he’d have been hiding from the witchfinders!

Greg is also a versatile painter and the film includes no fewer than five demonstrations including a riverside scene, a complex boatbuilder’s shed and a portrait so lifelike you expect it to speak. His style is loose and he uses shading and colour (words that recur again and again throughout the film) to convey shape and substance. As so often happens, these aren’t always the colours you’d expect and it’s the juxtaposition and contrast rather than exact copying that convey the subject.

There’s another phrase that crops up: “If I can’t see it, I can’t paint it.” On the surface, that seems obvious, but what Greg means is that he needs to be able to see how a scene, or an element of one, translates into his three effects and how colours, and especially shadows, work.

At the end of the film, there’s a fascinating short section in which Greg explains how he has added finishing touches to each of the demonstration paintings back in the studio, changing lighting, adding or removing detail and muting or brightening colours. Even though the process isn’t shown, the explanations are so clear that you really don’t get left wanting more and I actually think making this longer could have been dull and mechanical.

This is a hugely entertaining and informative piece that perfectly captures Greg’s enthusiasm for a medium that certainly can be fun.

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Boats & Harbours in Acrylic (What to Paint) || Charles Evans

I’ve written elsewhere about the basics of this series, so maybe this isn’t the place to repeat everything.

Suffice it to say that Charles Evans is always good value and has an excellent eye (or should that be nose?) for what the budding painter needs. There’s a splendid variety of subjects here from Polperro to a Greek boatyard and small craft to an icebreaker and a galleon in full sail. Seas are rough, choppy and calm and there are plenty of different weather and lighting conditions.

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Travelling Light || Ray Balkwill

It’s a good few years since someone told me I should check out the West Country artist Ray Balkwill and I’ve been a fan of his work ever since.

This new collection showcases an excellent variety and quantity of his paintings and even includes a chapter on methods and materials – Ray is candid about the way he works and isn’t averse to sharing. Locations include his home territory, of course, but also Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Italy and France. Ray is at home with most subjects, although it has to be said that his paintings really come alive when boats and water are involved.

Ray is often characterised as a mixed media artist, but the truth is that medium isn’t the raison d’être of how he works. He’s not a “media” painter at all, I’d contend, rather a painter who works with whatever best suits and interprets the particular part of the subject he’s working on. For a more detailed demonstration and analysis of his working methods, have a look at his DVD, Capturing Coastal Moods.

This is a beautiful book and will appeal to those who appreciate good art, lovers of landscape and waterscape and, of course, fans of Ray’s work. The quantity and quality of the illustrations will pretty much guarantee that no-one will be disappointed, or even regard the book as particularly expensive.

Travelling Light: The Sketches and Paintings of Ray Balkwill
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Painting Boats & Harbours in Watercolour || Terry Harrison

This straightforward guide is full of Terry’s trademark no-nonsense instruction that’s made him the popular teacher and demonstrator that he is. It also sticks nicely to its brief and contains almost nothing except the subject matter of the title – extraneous details that only serve to complicate the scene and how to paint it are ignored. Even the section on “boatyard clutter” is arranged so that, while the boatyard may be cluttered, the painting isn’t. As a result, apart from a course in maritime subjects, you also get a bit of a masterclass in simplification.

After an introduction to materials, using colour and working from photographs, you’re straight into a simple exercise in getting boat shapes right. This is important as craft sit on the water and mistakes here can make them look all-to-ready to capsize. From there, it’s a simple scene with a small cutter resting in calm waters. This is followed by some reflections and then a few ripples. It all builds up progressively and it’s not long before you’re ready to start tackling rigging.

The bulk of the book is a series of demonstrations – some of simple subjects like jetties and some more complex, but always building on the skills you have and adding more as you go along. Boats and water don’t need to be difficult, as Terry shows, and he blows away a great deal of the mystique that surrounds the subject and he makes it readily accessible in the process.

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Joe Dowden’s Complete Guide to Painting Water in Watercolour || Joe Francis Dowden

When it comes to water, Joe Dowden’s your man. If you want that elusive quality of depth and solidity, the way water occupies rather than lying on a surface, he’s got it. One of the exercises in this genuinely comprehensive book is of a wet pavement, a simple subject that’s really tricky because the water and the flagstones are effectively the same thing, but he pulls it off perfectly. Another is a child running through the shallow ripples at the edge of the tide and, again, he manages to get the passing-through-ness without the feet being engulfed or somehow tripping along on top. Both these little moments are virtuoso performances that aren’t even the big set pieces of the book.

Joe doesn’t just paint water, but the things that surround water – trees, landscapes, people (he’s particularly good on people), boats and light. The thing about water is that it’s a reactive subject, informed and shaped by the things that illuminate it, reflect in and off it and shape it with waves, ripples and spray.

There’s a huge amount of material here and I can’t find a stone that isn’t – often literally – left unturned. Books that make big claims sometimes fail to live up to them and need a qualification, but this delivers everything you could want.

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DVD Watercolour Fast and Free || John Hoar

Watching John Hoar paint is fascinating. Most artists start with the sky and/or a wash and it’s not that John never does. However, he does a great deal of structural work at the beginning so that the final image coalesces in the last third or so of the demonstration. It’s a bit like learning a language by starting with the grammar and then hanging the vocabulary on it. Yes, it can be done, but it’s a very academic exercise and you don’t really get to say anything for ages. When you do though, it’s perfectly formed. And that’s the way it is with a John Hoar painting. “Paintings are made up of shapes rather than lines”, as he puts it.

Well, that’s all pretty dull then, isn’t it? No, and the reason is that, instead of spending the demonstration describing what he’s doing (and what you can see perfectly well for yourself), John tends to talk about the creative process itself. This makes the film a bit like the Patrick George DVD I reviewed a while back, but with demonstrations. If you want to learn the mechanics of painting, then this is maybe not for you. If you want to follow the process of creating an image from what’s in front of you, it’s pretty much riveting. John is by no means a slavish representer and his simplification of the complex shapes and structure of Ely Cathedral (the film consists of four demonstrations around the town) is a masterclass.

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