My Impressionist Landscape

[scottb]

MY IMAGE(S):





GENERAL INFORMATION:
Title: My Impressionist Landscape
Year Created: 2000
Medium: Oil
Surface: Canvas
Dimension: 18x24
Allow digital alterations?: Yes!

MY COMMENTS:
This piece was created a couple of years ago. I posted it originally in the old Critique forum here, but I thought I'd throw this out to help kick start the new Structured Critique forum.

I haven't painted much since I did this piece, primarily because of time constraints.

MY QUESTIONS FOR THE GROUP:
Any and all comments welcome! In particular, I'd like comments on color application and my brushwork.

[Amorphis]

Hi Scott,

Regarding the brush strokes, I think that you've done a good job on the sky but to me it feels like the water could use some more attention. I feel the reflection of the trees (and this relates to colour as well) should be not such a mass but rather the green (reflections) a bit more sparse and a bit more integrated into the blue (water). In general I think the colours work really well, in particular the blue water echoing the blue sky (or vice versa).

[mjkohler]

Hi Scott, I like the bold strokes in your sky and the variation of colour and stroke. I would like to see that boldness in your water with perhaps the lighter and dark in the water on the right hand side switched around. mjk

[glowbug]

I have 3 suggestions . The first is that I can't decide what the lighter color green that seems to be in the background on the left side of the picture is. I think the color does not look natural to nature and wonder if it would call less attention to itself if it were toned down and brought more to the orange side of the spectrum.

Secondly, I think the picture would sparkle more if you could add some touches of deep red to the shadow side of the tree branches , and vary the green of the grass more.

Thirdly, the trees are very uniform and lined up in a row. Perhaps just bringing one nearer to the water, and moving one further back would create more interest and create some depth. It would then eliminate the look that they sprang from the edge of the grass.

These are just my two cents worth. I don't know enough about photoshop to make the changes to demonstrate.

[lori]

hi scott...

beautiful work. i have only seen one work of yours and that was an abstraction, so i was nicely surprised by this.

a few things come to mind when looking at this though. they mainly revolve around the tree and the shadows. i see that you have the light coming from the upper right hand side creating a diagonal shadow, but in the water you have given them a verticle reflection.

i believe this creates a disturbance in the work as it pictorially doesn't make sense, and it causes the water and the trees to suddenly become static, especially the water.

i think that if you were to give the same diagonal treatment to the reflection, this painting would start to move again and the brush strokes would come back to life.

your brush strokes are dynamic which is great, so having this sudden stop sign (reflections) in the work causes ones eye to stop travelling the canvas, which isn't good with this type of impressionist brush movement. it actually turns into a distraction of sorts.

the colors are sweet, however i'd also blend them further where the elements change. for example the green and yellow pastures have a distinct hard edge to them that would be better suited with more of a subtle blend to bring them together. especially the right hand side with the mountains in the back.

i understand how busy you've been and i know how hard it is to keep focused on painting (boy do i understand...lol), but geez scott...look at this beautiful work! now make sometime for yourself...you deserve it!

[walden]

I couldn't do an Impressionist painting to save my life-- but I've spent a lot of time looking at them, and it seems to me that they usually brought in touches of complements to give it that sparkle. When I look closely at a Monet, I'll see all sorts of different colors everywhere, then I step back and somehow they all come together-- but I think it is the effects of the complements that make the color effect.

[artemio]

I think it could be improved a little bit more on the shadows areas, adding more colors to it as purples and reds.

[m_a_r_t_i_n]

Likes:
Some very nice brushwork.

dislikes:
Not much happening with the composition.
Shadows look too dark.