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Leonid Afremov is a Belarus born, Israeli modern painter who creates unique landscapes, cityscapes and figures using a palette knife rather than a brush to paint.

“I tried different techniques during my career, but I especially fell in love with painting with oil and pallette-knife. Every artwork is the result of long painting process; every canvas is born during the creative search; every painting is full of my inner world. Each of my paintings brings different mood, colors and emotions. I love to express the beauty, harmony and spirit of this world in my paintings. My heart is completely open to art. Thus, I enjoy creating inspired and beautiful paintings from the bottom of my soul. Each of my artworks reflects my feelings, sensitivity, passion, and the music from my soul. True art is alive and inspired by humanity. I believe that art helps us to be free from aggression and depression.“

~ Leonid Afremov

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\\ tags: Oil Painting

“Love of beauty is Taste. The creation of beauty is Art.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson) I am not an artist myself and I am not a great art expert, but I am always moved by great art. Art is not just beauty recreated; it is an expression of love, passion, and the heart’s deepest emotions. Need some inspiration? Just look at these amazing paintings! There are no words to describe their beauty… What can inspire more than a great masterpiece?

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Essential decisions to make before you start a painting.

Is it necessary to plan a painting in careful detail before you start, or should you let it evolve as you go along? Planning a painting can be a help as you know exactly what you’re going to do, but it could also inhibit spontaneity. Letting a painting evolve as you work is very free and lets you be spontaneous, but also leaves you open to the possibility that the painting won’t go anywhere and you’ll end up with a mess.

Ultimately the degree to which you plan out a painting depends on your personality, some people find it essential and others a hindrance. But regardless of how detailed you like to plan (or not), there are several decisions that have to be made before you to start to paint.

1. Decide On a Subject
Deciding on a subject is the logical first step as it influences the format of the support, the type of support used, and the technique you’re going to use to create the painting.

If you’ve only a vague idea of what to do with an appealing subject, such as a glorious landscape, sketching or doing small studies rather than a full painting will enable you to see whether the composition and selection of elements works well without wasting time or materials. A pleasing study can then be used as the basis or reference for a full-scale painting.

But if you find that doing a study makes you stiffen up when you come to do the large-scale painting because you’re focusing on replicating it, rather than it reminding you sufficiently of the original scene, consider doing only quick sketches to see if a composition works and taking reference photos to work from back in your studio.

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\\ tags: Paint, Painting

Various methods for checking that the perspective or angles in a paint

If you’re aiming to have a realistic painting, with accurate perspective, then it’s crucial to get the angles of the elements in the painting accurate. Not only the angles of how the objects lie in relation to each other, but also of the items themselves.

Here are various ways to measure angles:
• Hold your brush or a pencil up vertically then judge the angle by thinking of the small hand on a clock. Does the edge go out from the vertical at four o’clock or five o’clock? Or, even more accurately, by thinking of the large hand on a clock – does the edge go out at five minutes past twelve or three minutes past?

• Line a pencil or brush up with the angle then, holding it at the same angle, move it down to your painting to check the angle you’ve got.

• If you find that you move the brush when doing this, try using two pencils.

Line them up against two edges in the object so that they overlap. Now grasp them firmly where they overlap and bring them down to your painting to check the angle.

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\\ tags: Painting

How to improve your painting through your love for chocolate.

You don’t have to be a total chocoholic to appreciate the many levels of pleasure that comes from chocolate. There’s the often-agonising decision of what to buy this time: a favourite or something new, a big bar of cheap chocolate or a small imported bar? The anticipation while getting through the wrapper, making sure you don’t leave any tiny bits of foil to hit a filling. The distinctive crack as you break off a piece. The picking up with a licked finger of any crumbs. The popping of the piece in your mouth. The slow melting on your tongue….

But then there are the side effects, such as all those calories, the high fat and sugar content, the triggering of migraines. Which is where your paint brushes come in, because painting also rewards us with a ‘high’. And while I’m too much of a chocoholic myself to suggest that painting could (or should) ever replace chocolate in your life, here a few ways to use your love for chocolate to the benefit of your painting:

• Reward ‘Good’ Behaviour: So you really, really fancy a chocolate.

Okay then, give in to the temptation and buy it, but then use it as the subject for a painting – and no eating it until you’ve finished the painting! Or if you know you won’t be able to wait that long, investigate and sketch the compositional possibilities: as the sole object in a still life, as a still life with the till slip and change, with the wrapper scrunched next to it, broken in pieces, a cross-section, with a bite taken out of it, just the empty wrapper and a few crumbs (and maybe some ants).

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\\ tags: Painting

Tips to help you write a personal artist’s statement to accompany your paintings

An artist’s statement is a short piece written by the artist to accompany a particular painting or group of paintings. An artist’s statement shouldn’t be dismissed as insignificant or dashed out in a hurry as it’s a vital selling tool, promoting and explaining your work to people looking at your paintings, whether they’re potential buyers, exhibition curators, critics, fellow artists, or casual browsers.

At its best, an artist’s statement reads easily, is informative, and adds to your understanding of the artist and the painting. At its worse, an artist’s statement is difficult to understand or rambles on, is pretentious, and irritates rather than informs (or, even, provokes laughter).

How Long Should an Artist’s Statement Be?
Rather make an artist’s statement too short than too long – most people simply won’t have the patience to read a lengthy treatise and many will be put off before they’ve even started.

Aim at around 100 words or three short paragraphs.

What Should an Artist’s Statement Say?
An artist’s statement should be an explanation of your painting style and subjects or themes. Add a bit about your approach or philosophy if you wish. Mention your education, specifically if you’ve studied art (the closer you are to the date you left art college, the more relevant this is). Consider mentioning which artists (living and dead) have influenced or inspired you. Mention any significant awards you have won, exhibitions you have participated in, collections your paintings appear in or significant sales you may have made, and painting organisations or societies you belong to. Remember, though, you’re aiming to create professional credibility by highlighting your achievements, not providing a full resume. If you don’t have a formal art qualification, don’t worry, it’s your paintings that make you an artist, not your qualifications.

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The colors Van Gogh used in his paintings.

The most commonly known facts about Vincent van Gogh are that he cut off his left ear (actually only a part) and presented it to a prostitute, that he sold only one painting during his lifetime (actually there is evidence to suggest that it was more than one), and that he committed suicide (true).

Few realize quite how significant his contribution was to painting, that his adventurous use of color changed the direction of art. Van Gogh deliberately set about using colors to capture mood and emotion, rather than using colors realistically. At the time, this was completely unheard of.

“Instead of trying to exactly what I see before me, I make more arbitrary use of color to express myself more forcefully.”

When he first devoted himself to painting full time, in 1880, Van Gogh used dark and gloomy earth colors such as raw umber, raw sienna, and olive green.

These were very suited the miners, weavers, and peasant farm laborers who were his subjects. But the development of new, more lightfast pigments and his exposure to the work of the Impressionists, who were striving to capture the effects of light in the work, saw him introduce bright hues into his palette: reds, yellows, oranges, greens, and blues.

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How an attempt to make a red pigment, created Prussian blue instead.

Any artist who enjoys using Prussian blue will find it hard to imagine that such a beautiful blue was actually the result of an experiment gone wrong. The discoverer of Prussian blue, the colormaker Diesbach, was in fact not trying to make a blue, but a red. The creation of Prussian blue, the first modern, synthetic color was completely accidental.

Diesbach, working in Berlin, was attempting to create cochineal red lake in his laboratory. (”Lake” was once a label for any dye-based pigment; these days it’s used with relation to red only. “Cochineal” was originally obtained by crushing the bodies of cochineal insects.) The ingredients he needed were iron sulphate and potash. In a move that’ll bring a smile to any artist’s who’s ever tried to save money by buying cheap materials, he obtained some contaminated potash from the alchemist in whose laboratory he was working, Johann Konrad Dippel.

The potash had been contaminated with animal oil and was due to be thrown out.

When Diesbach mixed the contaminated potash with the iron sulphate, instead of the strong red he was expecting, he got one that was very pale. He then attempted to concentrate it, but instead of a darker red he was expecting, he first got a purple, then a deep blue. He’d accidentally created the first synthetic blue pigment, Prussian blue.

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\\ tags: Painting, Prussian Blue

Where, How, and Why to Add a Signature to a Painting

Adding your signature to a painting is like adding a stamp to it that reads “finished”. It’s a sign that you’re satisfied with the painting and no longer consider it a work in progress.

Is It Really Necessary to Sign a Painting?
It’s not a legal requirement, but if you don’t add your name to a painting, how will anyone know who the artist is? You may argue that you’ve a very familiar style that people will recognize, but what if it’s the first time someone’s encountered your work? How will they find out who the artist is then? If it’s hanging in a gallery it’ll have a label with your name on it, but what if it’s in the lounge of someone who’s bought a painting and they can’t remember who the artist was? Think about the works by famous artists which are ‘rediscovered’ every now and then; is this a fate you want to risk for your paintings?

What Should My Signature Look Like?
The most important thing is that people must be able to read it.

An illegible signature isn’t a sign that you’re extremely creative and it doesn’t add a level of intrigue to the painting. You’re the artist, so let it be known. But at the same time, don’t make it look like you’re using a stamp. You don’t have to sign your whole name on the front of the painting, you could just put your initials but it’s wise to put your full name on the back of the painting. The same applies if you use a symbol or monograph; people have to have some way of knowing what it stands for.

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Things to consider when looking at a painting.

When you’re looking at a painting critically with a view to giving a critique to the artist and, equally, when you’re critiquing your own paintings, here are some of the things you ought to consider:

• Size: Remember to take a look at the actual size of the painting and try to visualize it that big rather than the size of the photo on your computer screen.

• Shape: Does the shape of the canvas (landscape or portrait) suit the subject matter? For example, a very long and thin canvas can add to the drama of a landscape.

• Artist’s Statement: Has the artist achieve their stated aim? Do you agree with their statement or interpretation of their painting, remembering that what the artist intends and what the viewer sees aren’t always the same thing.

• Title of the Painting: What is the title of the painting? What does it tell you about the painting and how does it guide your interpretation? Think about how you might have interpreted the painting if it had been called something else.

• Subject Matter: What is the painting of? Is it unusual, unexpected, controversial or intriguing? Does it lend itself to comparison to work by a famous painter? Do you understand the symbolism in the painting?

• Emotional Response: Does the painting generate an emotional reaction in you? What is the overall mood of the painting, and is this suitable for the subject?

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