This is a great exercise for anyone.
Whether you are a beginning artist or have years of painting experience, it never hurts to sharpen your observational skills.
We all have pre-conceived notions of how objects appear.
We all know what a tree looks like. We know the shape of a pear differs from the shape of an apple.
An orange may be the same shape as an apple but has a textured appearance.
A Mind’s Eye View
To do this exercise, set up a simple still life. Do this in your mind, not on a table. If a still life does not strike your fancy, imagine a quiet landscape containing a few of your favorite things. Perhaps you envision a stream or pond, a winding road and rolling hills. Make it uncomplicated, whatever your choice.
Draw your composition as you normally would. We are not too concerned about a particular style. Just concentrate on a realistic representation. Once you are finished with your composition, you are ready to paint.
Simple Color Choices
Choose your weapon. Use watercolor, oil, acrylic or pastels. For this study, select a limited palette. Simplify your color choices to either analogous colors, complementary colors or three primary colors. If you are painting with oils or acrylic, you may wish to add white to your array.
Go ahead and paint your composition, using all the rules, tricks and tips you have learned to produce a good painting. Do not use any reference material to do your painting. This is an exercise to see just how well you observe and how accurate your memory is.
Add all the highlights, lowlights, reflected light and shadowing to make this a completed work. Now stand back and take an impartial look. Compare it to reference materials to see how your imagination holds up to the actual item. How did you do?
Mind Over Matter
At times, it is shocking to see how little we really do observe that which is around us. We look, but do not see. People tend to have vague notions of things at best. Artists need to immerse themselves in what they are drawing and painting. An undeveloped image is a disservice to both the artist and the viewer.
Observation is a skill that is learned and developed. For an artist, practicing the art of observation is selecting an object, person or scene and recording it on paper or canvas. It is a simple procedure, but one that can be time consuming and frustrating. It requires concentration, patience and repetition.
As part of a self directed course of learning to become a better artist, set aside regular time for observation and sketching. Whether you prefer pencils, pastel or pen and ink, it is a good idea to keep a sketchbook. This exercise can be done almost anywhere. Keep a sketchpad available for car rides, waiting rooms and boring TV nights. Fill the book with whatever you see around you. Keep drawing that same object until you understand how it is composed and what makes it look the way it does.
In looking at an object, the whole picture is sometimes confusing. Develop the ability to observe fine details and focus on those. For example, a person’s head is a complex thing to draw. However, if it is broken down into manageable parts, it does not seem quite as overwhelming. Practice drawing a mouth. Draw baby mouths. Draw old men’s lips. Draw a pretty girl’s smile. Move on to the nose, ears or eyes.
If you are not interested or up to that challenge, try working on flowers. Dissect the manner by which nature forms a blossom, how the petals attach to the stem and calyx, the veining on the leaves and the color variations of the plant. This process of investigation is useful for almost any object and makes for a far more believable subject when it is translated into a painting.
Observing the ways in which light and shadows affect the appearance of an object is also part of the learning, although this can be an entirely different exercise. Make this exercise a regular part of your creative workout, and watch how your artistic muscles bulge with the newfound skill.
