Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Artist Of The Day - Dave Kinsey [feedly]



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AAA: Abstraction Is an Asset to Your Art [feedly]



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AAA: Abstraction Is an Asset to Your Art
// Artist Daily

Abstraction is a key part of how you paint or draw anything. It is seeing completely with the eye, and not allowing the brain to contextualize what we are seeing. But turning off the brain is no small task! I've found that painting with acrylics has given me a bit of insight into abstraction for two reasons: when painting with acrylics, each layer dries fast--so I can practice seeing (and painting) abstractly over and over again in a fairly short period of time. Also, the paints are opaque, so gesture comes more strongly to the fore in any work because it is much less about blending than about making successive layers work together.

Earth and Shade II by John Harrell, acrylic painting.
Earth and Shade II by John Harrell, acrylic painting.

As I've confessed before, I'm usually a slowpoke ditherer when it comes to painting, largely due to the intimidation factor. When painting with acrylics, I found my speed because those paints dry fast! But that means that as soon as they do, I can go in again. I really enjoy the fact if I try to paint a figure or aspect of the landscape too literally, I can wait a few minutes, assess what I've done, and experiment more abstractly right then and there.

Sun Lovers by John Harrell, acrylic painting.
Sun Lovers by John Harrell, acrylic painting.
We all know that acrylic paints dry opaque unless you add a medium to make them more transparent. This solidity or opacity has proven helpful to a lot of artists who want to build up their abstraction chops. That's because you can see your gesture completely in every stroke you put on the canvas, as opposed to brushwork that layers on in a more transparent way. Exploring gesture in an acrylic painting is especially exciting if I use a palette knife because the entire surface of the painting is looser, more textural, and all about big shapes and color.

Artists featured in the latest issue of Acrylic Artist put abstraction and acrylic painting techniques together in compelling ways. They explore how to take aspects of art that are the most interesting and merge them to create appealing compositions and beautifully painted surfaces that can be appreciated abstractly and on the basis of representation. Enjoy!


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Atmospheric Watercolor Landscape Paintings [feedly]



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Atmospheric Watercolor Landscape Paintings
// Artist's Network

Plein air watercolor painter Stanislaw Zoladz exposes the sometimes hidden beauty in commonplace scenes, capturing captivating light effects and the lush contrasts between water, snow, rocks and buildings. In the December 2014 issue of Watercolor Artist, the artist discusses everything from the challenges of painting large to the joys of sketching on-site and the estimable Anders Zorn (Swedish, 1860-1920).

 

In I Dimma

In I Dimma

 

Ovader

Ovader

 

Regnvader Drar Bort

Regnvader Drar Bort

 

Sensommar

Sensommar

 

Strand Kant

Strand Kant

The post Atmospheric Watercolor Landscape Paintings appeared first on Artist's Network.


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Thursday, September 25, 2014

Flint's Watercolor Sketching Gear [feedly]



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Flint's Watercolor Sketching Gear
// Gurney Journey


Francis Russell Flint (1915-1977) was the son of the more famous watercolorist Sir William Russell Flint. He wrote a book called "Water-Colour for Beginners" which explains his suggested plein-air gear.

"There are many good types of easel available but I suggest the best is a small compact easel, not too light, and sufficiently strong not to be troubled by the wind. An aluminum or light wood easel may look very nice in a shop, but they are quite different in a strong breeze. The easel should have three telescopic legs with spikes at the ends, and at the apex of these a flat arm which can be firmly secured in any position, that will tip up and down on a hinge, and slide backwards and forwards."

Francis Russell Flint (1915-1977) 'Steps in the Sun ' St. Jean - de - Cole'
He preferred to stand rather than sit, so if he brought a stool, it was generally to use as a place to lay out his gear if he was painting in a wet or muddy place.

He said that the thing to look for in a watercolor box is deep wells for mixing generous washes, and the wells or depressions in the mixing area should have the deepest part toward the center, so that colors don't get mixed up with each other. He used a large sable brush for broad washes and an aluminum flask for extra water.

It's probably a safe bet that the son modeled this setup after the father. A vintage British Pathe film (linked below) showing Russell Flint's palette, which also has three deep wells.
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70sscifiart: Richard Powers [feedly]



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70sscifiart: Richard Powers
// Hyperwave



70sscifiart:

Richard Powers


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4 Science-Backed Ways To Have More Willpower [feedly]



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4 Science-Backed Ways To Have More Willpower
// Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement

self confidence tips

self confidence tips Self-control researcher Roy Baumeister led a groundbreaking study in 1996. People were led into a room which smelled of just-baked chocolate chip cookies. Then, cookies and chocolates were brought out for them to see. And finally, some participants were given two cookies to eat, but not all of them. One group of people was given raw radishes to eat instead! Poor souls. On a subsequent impossible puzzle designed to test a person's persistence, those who ate radishes were found to last less than half as long and took just over half the number of attempts as those who ate the cookies. (source) Willpower is an important part of changing yourself for the better—it's what helps you drag yourself out of bed at 6 AM for a morning workout; it also helps you resist chocolate chip cookies. But using willpower comes at a cost that was seen in this study—it's not unlimited. Since our willpower can be low at times when we most need it, here are four scientifically-backed ways to increase your willpower.

1. Eat (Short-Term Boost)

The simplest way to gain willpower is to eat something. Willpower energy is influenced by how much energy your brain has, and the brain's energy source is glucose. When you eat something, the body converts it into glucose energy for your brain and body to use. Table sugar and other fast-digesting carbohydrates are turned into glucose very quickly. Baumeister has found in his studies that glucose restoration can be the difference between someone quitting early or persisting. In one such study, his team found that people's willpower was restored quickly after drinking lemonade. (source) It's also common sense and experience that when we feel tired (from low blood sugar) that we're more susceptible to give in to bad habits and less likely to be productive (because of low willpower energy). So unless you need willpower to resist food, you can consider eating food to restore it.

2. Reward Yourself (Short-Term Boost)

Baumeister's work gave us the idea that glucose was a key way to refill willpower. But some other scientists wondered if the reward from food was a factor, either instead of or in addition to the glucose increase. They wondered this because when you consume sugar, it activates the reward area of your brain. To test this, they had two groups swish a liquid in their mouths and spit it out. One group swished with artificially-sweetened liquid and the other with sugar-sweetened liquid. This set-up was brilliant because artificial sweeteners do not trigger the reward center of the brain (because they're not food—the brain knows what's up). And because they didn't swallow the liquid, glucose-restoration was not a factor. In this way, they isolated the impact of the reward from consuming sugar. (source) They found that the reward from swishing sugar did have a willpower-restoring effect, and that swishing with artificial sweetener had no effect. I believe that glucose and rewards are both factors when it comes to restoring willpower. So that means when you are trying to resist fudge, maybe you should seek an alternative reward that doesn't involve food. This should help in two ways: it will distract you from the fudge and restore some of your willpower energy to resist it.

3. Practice (Long-Term Increase)

More than one study has found that one gains willpower by using willpower. But it needs to be intentional. I'm not sure that using willpower randomly does anything useful, or we'd all be willpower machines by now. It's the same reason why using muscles randomly throughout life doesn't make people extremely strong—it requires intentional training. In one study, students were tasked to focus on improving their posture for 2 weeks, and their self-control had improved versus those who did not. Importantly, their improved willpower was general. Willpower improvements were seen in areas unrelated to their posture. (source) The common metaphor for willpower is that it's a muscle, and like muscles, it is strengthened by using it and weakened by inactivity.

4. Trick Your Brain Into Practicing Even When Tired (Short-Term & Permanent Increase)

The last and my favorite way to have more willpower is to trick your subconscious brain. The reason we need willpower in the first place is because our conscious mind and subconscious mind have different desires. The subconscious is wired to want rewards and pleasurable experiences without regard to values and long-term results. Our conscious mind is what thinks about consequences of today's behaviors 20 years down the road. It can consider the appeal of now and the consequences of tomorrow. We need to use willpower when our conscious mind makes an "executive decision" and overrules our habitual preference. For example, saying no to a doughnut because it's unhealthy or not a part of the diet overrides the innate desire for the sugary reward. Another example is forcing yourself to exercise despite not feeling like it. In each case, the subconscious wants the easy way, but we know what's best for us. This dynamic is problematic only because willpower is limited. Once we're fatigued—as the aforementioned studies show—we lose willpower and are likely to fall back into bad habits or fail to keep up with our plans. The way to trick your brain is to lead a breadcrumb trail of steps to your goal. If you want to work out for 30 minutes, but your subconscious wants to be lazy, you can aim to put your workout clothes on. This isn't a dumb as it sounds—it's the first step! After that, you can aim to set up your mat or do a single push-up. Continue on in this fashion for essentially unlimited willpower. The reason it works so well is that the subconscious has trouble resisting such a reasonable favor. "Oh, only one push-up? Sure, we can do that." When a step is too easy to say "no" to, you'll do it. I've created a strategy based on this concept called "Mini Habits." I started doing one push-up a day in late 2012. Today, I do full workouts on most days. This strategy worked because the small goal exercised my willpower every day (it still requires a bit of willpower to do one push-up, especially if you have weak willpower as I did). And over time, exercise became habitual. Now I have stronger self-control and my life has improved in several ways as a result. These are direct results from my mini habits (and drastic improvements from before):
  • I exercise almost-daily
  • I write daily
  • I read daily
  • I juice vegetables daily and have a healthy diet
You can see how my health and career have improved, and I've also gained other benefits such as increased confidence. Investing in your willpower muscle is one of the best and most multi-beneficial things you can do. If you want to know the very best strategy for doing it, read Mini Habits. If you're not a reader, the book can help you there too. The first thing it asks is that you read two pages per day. You'll experience the power of the book as you read it. Read the reviews to see others' experiences. I'm Stephen Guise and I write about habit formation, focusing, and self-mastery at Deep Existence. If you join my Tuesday morning newsletter, you'll get eye-opening articles like this every week. On top of that, you'll get 40 desktop wallpapers, my stress-relief book, and access to the focus toolbox. It's ridiculous.

The post 4 Science-Backed Ways To Have More Willpower appeared first on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement.


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Pixar supercut arranged ROYGBIV [feedly]



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Pixar supercut arranged ROYGBIV
// Gurney Journey


ROYGBIV: A Pixar Supercut from Rishi Kaneria on Vimeo.
Editor Rishi Kaneria excerpted short scenes from the Pixar films and arranged them according to the spectrum, showing how much individual sequences are shifted to a particular narrow color gamuts. (Link to Vimeo video)

Here's the color script for the movie "Up." The high-chroma sequences are interspersed between gray or neutral ones, and the intense colors are reserved for important emotional moments of the film.

Film = color + time.

This color script for "The Incredibles" not only suggests a palette of colors for each sequence, but a set of basic geometric ingredients, known as the "shape language" for that part of the film.

All images © Disney/Pixar, via TNW
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Wednesday, September 24, 2014

New Paint Brushes for Artists: Orange Ice from FM Brush Company - Artist's Network [feedly]



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New Paint Brushes for Artists: Orange Ice from FM Brush Company - Artist's Network
http://www.artistsnetwork.com/holiday-gift-guides/new-paint-brushes-for-artists-orange-ice-from-fm-brush-company
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Vintage-Inspired Illustrations by Gosia Herba Are Sorta Dark… And I like It [feedly]



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Vintage-Inspired Illustrations by Gosia Herba Are Sorta Dark… And I like It
// Brown Paper Bag

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Gosia Herba

Gosia Herba is a Polish illustrator whose editorial images feature larger-than-life women, reflections that have a mind of their own, and other surreal situations. It's this, coupled with her vintage-inspired style (even some elements of Cubism thrown in there!), that initially drew me to her work.

I love illustrations that offer me something beneath the surface. Goisa's work looks wonderful, but it's also strange and a little dark, and it leaves a lasting impression on me.

(H/T my pal Perrin)

Gosia Herba magazine8 magazine7magazine9magazine3 magazine2

magazine1magazine6

The post Vintage-Inspired Illustrations by Gosia Herba Are Sorta Dark… And I like It appeared first on Brown Paper Bag.


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The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith [feedly]



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The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith
// Colossal

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

The First Law of Kipple: An Entire Floor Filled With Chromatically Arranged Junk by Dan Tobin Smith  trash installation

About 3 months ago photographer Dan Tobin Smith set up a website to ask the public to donate kipple: junk that was lying around their house. "It's time to free yourself of the pointless or unused objects in your life," read the plea. "Give them a purpose as part of Dan Tobin Smith's installation for the London Design Festival 2014."

Sure enough, the donations began coming in and in no time at all Smith had enough junk on his hands to create a sprawling installation that filled an entire floor and mezzanine, "carpeting 200-square-metres with a dense, precise, chromatically-themed arrangement of thousands of objects." The objects are so carefully placed that gradients seem to blend together seamlessly.

The fictional word Kipple was coined by science fiction writer Philip K Dick. Kipple appears in his 1968 novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" (the film adaptation was Blade Runner) and is used to describe useless, pointless stuff that humans accumulate. It served as the inspiration for Smith's installation "The First Law of Kipple," which was part of London Design Festival this month. (via Creative Review)


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