Albrecht Dürer watercolor

There was an article Friday on Northern Renaissance artist, Albrecht Dürer, in the New York Times by Holland Cotter. I was struck by this watercolor which Cotter describes as, "In the 1503 watercolor 'Virgin and Child With a Multitude of Animals and Plants,” Dürer seems to depict the world as a vast petting zoo.'"

SPRING WATERCOLOR CLASSES

My Class, Introduction to Water Color, at Kala Art Institute Starts March 12:

Introduction to Watercolor

Francesca Pastine
Class #28: Tuesdays, March 12, 19, & 26, 6:30-9:30pm
Tuition $135

The spontaneity and luminosity of watercolor on paper is unsurpassed and can be used to enhance and personalize your prints. This class will engage you in a laboratory of techniques and practice designed to make you comfortable with the watercolor medium. You will begin to set up experiments that will lead you to your own unique visual language. Methods of critical analysis, color literacy, contemporary painting issues, and basic painting methods and skills will be introduced. I will demonstrate color flooding, wet into wet, color luminosity, soft and hard edges, and special techniques to create verve and visual interest in your work.
Francesca Pastine was born in New York City and received her MFA at the San Francisco Art Institute. She has had exhibitions throughout the Bay Area and many major cities including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Seattle, Milwaukee, and Sofia. Pastine is represented by Eleanor Harwood Gallery in San Francisco and Pentimenti Gallery. in Philadelphia. She will participate in an exhibit, Rebound: Dissections and Excavations in Book Art, at Halsey Contemporary Art Centre at the University of North Carolina in 2013. Pastine is the recipient of Pollock-Krasner Grant and a Kala Art Institute Fellowship. She has taught art at the San Francisco Art Institute, California College of the Arts, the City College of San Francisco, and Dominican University.
http://francesca.pastineart.com

REGISTER NOW

& I have two classes starting in April at CCSF:

Painting: Introduction to Watercolor Workshop
Class #: AR425 Register Now
Watercolor is a beautiful and versatile medium which has recently been embraced by contemporary art practice. It is suited for larger studio work, for quick journal and travel sketches, or for painting in plein-air. This workshop is designed to introduce students to all aspects of watercolor materials and techniques such as color, transparency, texture, wet into wet, and other tricks of the trade. You will be introduced to artists working in this medium through books and local art exhibitions. Gain confidence with watercolor and begin your exploration of this luminous and exciting medium. Take advantage of the spontaneity and inherent beauty of the watercolor medium, while engaging your personal vision through the unique experience that watercolor has to offer.
Instructor: Francesca Pastine
Cost: $150
Cost: $135 (if registered up to one week before the class begins)
Day: Tues.        # of meetings: 5
Date(s): 4/9 - 5/7
Time: 6:30 PM - 9:30 PM
Location: Fort Mason, Bldg B     Rm: 203

Painting with Water Media
Class #: AR478 Register Now

The purpose of this class is to engage you in a laboratory of contemporary practice using water based media such as watercolor paint, gouache, ink and non-traditional media such as coffee.  We will explore how watermedia reacts on different surfaces. The spontaneity and luminosity of water based material on paper is unsurpassed. You will begin to set up experiments that will lead you to your own unique visual language. Methods of critical analysis, color literacy, contemporary painting issues, and basic painting methods and skills will be introduced. There will be slide lectures, suggested exhibitions and readings, and group interaction through critiques and shared experience.
Instructor: Francesca Pastine
Cost: $150
Cost: $135 (if registered up to one week before the class begins)
Day: Thurs.        # of meetings: 5
Date(s): 4/18 - 5/16
Time: 6:30 PM - 9:30 PM
Location: Fort Mason, Bldg B     Rm: 203
Material fee (pay to instructor):  $10

CCSF INTRODUCTION TO WATERCOLOR WORKSHOP

My Introduction to Watercolor Workshop starts Tuesday April 9. This five week workshop consists of daily lessons and assignments that progressively improve your skills and knowledge. The class will encourage and enlighten you on your search for a balance between ideas and forms that best give voice to your paintings. Whatever the level of your experience, you will be encouraged to approach your painting with vigor and an open mind through the ebb and flow of technique and personal vision.

There is a discount on early registration :)

John Singer Sargent (American, 1856–1925). The Cashmere Shawl, circa 1911. Translucent watercolor and touches of opaque watercolor and wax resist with graphite underdrawing, 19 15/16 x 14 in. (50.7 x 35.5 cm). Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Hayden Collection—Charles Henry Hayden Fund. Photograph © 2013 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

John Singer Sargent Watercolors

 

JOHN SINGER SARGENT WATERCOLORS AT THE BROOKLYN MUSEUM

A great opportunity if you're in the area to see these splendid watercolors!

Here is the write up from the Brooklyn Museum website:

This landmark exhibition unites for the first time the John Singer Sargent watercolors acquired by the Brooklyn Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in the early twentieth century. The culmination of a yearlong collaborative study by both museums, John Singer Sargent Watercolors explores the watercolor practice that has traditionally been viewed as a tangential facet of Sargent’s art making. The ninety-three pieces on display provide a once-in-a-generation opportunity to view a broad range of the artist’s finest production in the medium.
Brooklyn’s thirty-eight watercolors, most of which have not been on view for decades, were largely purchased from Sargent’s 1909 debut exhibition in New York. Their subjects include Venetian scenes (The Bridge of Sighs), Mediterranean sailing vessels, intimate portraits (A Tramp), and Bedouin subjects (Bedouins). Boston’s watercolors, purchased in 1912, are more highly finished than the Brooklyn works. They feature subjects from his travels to the Italian Alps, the villa gardens near Lucca, and the marble quarries of Carrara, as well as portraits. The exhibition also presents nine oil paintings, including Brooklyn’s An Out-of-Doors Study, Paul Helleu and His Wife (1889) and Boston’s The Master and His Pupils (1914).
New discoveries based on scientific study of Sargent’s pigments, drawing techniques, and paper preparation are featured in a special section deconstructing his techniques. Select works throughout the exhibition are paired with videos that show a contemporary watercolor artist demonstrating some of Sargent’s methods.

JUST ADD WATER: Watercolor Exhibition at Studio Quercus

STUDIO QUERCUS

JAN 12 – FEB 16, 2013

Also open for Oakland Art Murmur

Just Add Water

A survey of Bay Area artists who use water-based media on paper.

Artist’s Reception: Saturday Jan 12, 4–6pm

About the Exhibition:

Studio Quercus is pleased to present Just Add Water, a survey of Bay Area artists who use water-based media on paper. The show, featuring works by eight artists with widely varied approaches, opens January 12 and concludes February 16.
Water-based work, employing watercolor, gouache, ink, or acrylic, traditionally has been used to explore ideas that might later be fully developed in oil on canvas. However, the spirit of experimentation and exploration that is associated with works on paper can be beautiful and inspiring, and is echoed by the artists featured in this show.
The featured artists — Amy Wilson Faville, John Fadeff, Michael Hall, Scott Hewicker, Alex Jackson, Carrie Lederer, Kara Maria, and Francesca Pastine — offer a broad overview of what is possible in water-based mediums.

Watercolor Paintings in the Barns Collection & Winslow Homer at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

I had a great time in Philadelphia last November looking at Art.  I was able to visit the Barns Collection. I saw a fantastic Winslow Homer exhibit at the Philadelphia museum, Shipwreck! I also saw "Dancing Around the Bride," which included some conceptual watercolors by John Cage and Marcel Duchamp.

The Barns has amazing work by Charles Demuth, and Paul Cezanne amoung others.  Here are some images from that collection:

charles Demuth

charles Demuth

Jules Pascin

American and Bulgarian, active in France, 1885–1930

Offering to Venus (Offrande à Vénus)

1922Watercolor, gouache, graphite, and brown ink on thin paperboard18 3/4 x 16 3/4 in. (47.6 x 42.5 cm)

 

 

French

Red and Blue Flowers and White Daisy

c. 1840Watercolor with graphite underdrawing on parchment9 3/16 x 7 1/4 in. (23.3 x 18.4 cm) 

 

 

 

 

Paul Signac

French, 1863–1935

Genève

1919Watercolor with graphite underdrawing on thin wove paper7 3/4 x 11 1/2 in. (19.7 x 29.2 cm)

  

Paul Klee

 

 

 

Paul Cézanne

French, 1839–1906

Trees (Arbres)

c. 1900 (possibly earlier)Watercolor and graphite on laid paper12 3/16 x 18 11/16 in. (31 x 47.5 cm)

Paul Cézanne

French, 1839–1906

The Coach House (La Remise à Château Noir)

1890–1895Watercolor and graphite on wove paper12 3/8 x 19 1/16 in. (31.4 x 48.4 cm)

 

Paul Cézanne

French, 1839–1906

The Coach House (La Remise à Château Noir)

1890–1895Watercolor and graphite on wove paper12 3/8 x 19 1/16 in. (31.4 x 48.4 cm)

 

IMAGE FROM "SHIPWRECK!" AT PHILADELPHIA MUSEUM OF ART

Painting with Water Based Media Class at CCSF

My CCSF class, Painting With Water-Based Media, runs April 19 through May 16

The purpose of this course is to engage you in a laboratory of contemporary practice using water-based mediums such as watercolor paint, gouache, and ink. We will also experiment with different surfaces and collage. You will begin to set up experiments that will lead you to your own unique visual language. you will be introduced to the process and techniques of traditional watercolor painting and water media as a component to mixed media works. Methods of critical analysis, color literacy, contemporary painting issues, and basic painting methods and skills will be introduced. We will communicate ideas and concepts through artistic development and art making; complete individual and collaborate art practices; and combine visual thinking and creative problem solving in the creation of finished paintings. There will be image lectures, suggested exhibitions and readings, and group interaction through critiques and shared experience. you will be asked to maintain a visual journal that communicates creative process, assignments, ideas and musings through drawing, collage and water media experiments.

Examples of interesting works with traditional and untraditional methods.  For example, Mary Delany creates rich black grounds in ink to bolster the luminosity of her botanical paintings. Ross Bleckner uses bleach on his watercolors, Wangechi mutu uses collage and inks on vellum.

Mary Delany

ink and watercolor

 yvonne estrada

ball point pen, graphite, watercolor, ink

 ross bleckner

watercolor

wangechi mutu

mixed media on vellum