Spring Session Begins

by Jane Morris Pack

The new Spring semester is just beginning at The Aegean Center.  We have six returning students from last term who have rejoined us.  Three of our students are from India and we have an Italian woman who lives in Norway. Other students are from the US and Canada.  Some of the local Greeks also participate in classes. Our group is truly international.

We have had some rain this last month and the island is green and lush. We took our first walk into the hills on Friday up to Lefkes followed by a full taverna meal at Flora’s.

As always the nervous first meeting settles us all as we greet each other and begin to have a feeling for the group. Each session has its own personality and rhythm which emerges in the first weeks. We’re all looking forward to seeing the students grow technically and stretch their creative wings.

Student Post: Jordann Wine

I graduated three years ago from a well-known private university in New York City. Due to my interdisciplinary studies, I took a variety of classes in fine arts, business, economics, writing, Swahili and a slew of liberal arts courses. With each class I learned a great deal of knowledge about the topic and myself, but I was never inspired to act upon my education. In fact my life in New York City became rigid and stagnant; I no longer went with the flow of life, but tried to control each and every bit of life that I could.

Art had been a large part of my life growing up. In high school I even took two art classes a year, but in university, art began to slip away from me. After my second year of university, I no longer thought of myself as an artist, and I stopped creating art for four years. At that point, I lost a huge part of myself.

Late last February I woke up on a cold Sunday morning with the guidance to come to the Aegean Center. I had recently started drawing again and had a few brief stints painting and began to realize that creating art energized me. The program started in one week, but I knew as last minute as this decision was, that I was meant to be in Greece in the spring and to be a part of the program.

And I was meant to be here. It was here that I found painting and drawing classes with Jun and Jane that sparked my imagination and inspired me to learn in ways that I had not done since I was a child. As someone who has also worked abstractly, the classical foundation classes were challenging, but kept me motivated and interested. Jane Pack’s figure drawing course particularly inspired me. Jane’s innovative and straightforward teaching technique introduced me to the human form, the way it moves, the way it has density and even those obscure names for bones, like the iliac crest, or muscles, like abductors. I was a sponge, able to absorb information easily and often. I never got tired of my education, and in fact wished there was more time in the day to learn more.

I am grateful for my years at a traditional university; I have a strong business background and great memories. Had I come to the Aegean Center at the age of 18, I may not have been able to take from it what I am now taking from it at the age of 26. I know that I am at a point in my life where I am receptive to an art education and I am now able to accept my path as an artist and a creative because of the nourishing and exceptional two semesters that I have had at the Aegean Center for the Fine Arts.

Student Post: Steven Kosovac

As another Italy session continues on Paros, I am still surprised to find myself a part of it. After a year away from the Aegean Center, I am back in the darkroom and digital darkroom with John Pack, putting together a final portfolio and helping out in the digital lab. A new semester means a new group of eager classmates and more time to focus on the technical aspects of fine art photography.

When the opportunity to return this semester came about during a difficult moment of transition for me, I felt my return to the Center was a necessary step before moving on with my education. It is not only the wisdom and passion of the teachers here that make this school so unique, but their desire to share it and to inspire their students in all aspects of art and life. My decision to return to Paros was not based on my love of the gentle Parian hillsides, the striking Greek light, or the Aegean Sea that shimmers and transforms itself endlessly, but instead on the Aegean Center community and the possibility of once again benefiting from the insight of the teachers and students here. Paros is an inspiring place but it is John, Jane, and the school that create a profound experience that the environment only enriches.

 

Aegean Center Perspective Studies

by Jane Morris Pack

Learning the secrets of perspective drawing takes on special significance when we are concurrently learning about the art of the Renaissance.  Leon Battista Alberti, the great Renaissance artist, architect and scholar detailed the methodology of mathematical perspective in 1435 when he published his book, ‘De Pintura’, in Florence.  The knowledge soon spread to every part of Europe as artists adopted one point perspective to project their figures into space and create a window into an imagined world.  This method assumes a single view point for the observer. The reduction of scale and overlapping of forms combine to work the magical transformation of a flat plane into a representation of  three dimensions.

Students at the Aegean Center learn to use one and two point perspective using simple exercises and then apply this knowledge to direct observation.  Once this is understood and absorbed then the drawing of rooms, buildings and furniture is a simple matter and more complex forms of designing space can be utilised.

Covering a lot of ground, and a lot of paper

by Jane Morris Pack

Today is the final day of the two week Figure Drawing Intensive at the Aegean Center. We are tired but exhilarated and all the participants have seen great improvement in their abilities to draw the figure.  I see startling jumps in the comprehension of form and anatomy, exactness of position and character of the pose. In the last few days the ability to concentrate and focus has increased and a one hour drawing flies by without awareness of the time passing.  We have worked in ink, finger paint, conte, charcoal and pencil.  Yesterday we drew portraits. Now time is needed to allow the information to sink in and enter the subconscious.

It was a joyful experience to teach this group.  Each student brought their unique skills and perspective and we all helped each other to achieve our best.  Thank you to Eleni, Elena, Ellie, Maia, Cassie, Penny, Isabel, Anglelika, and Avril for your contributions.

 

Figure Drawing Intensive at the Aegean Center

Nine students are attending the Figure Drawing Intensive now underway at the Aegean Center. Each morning we draw from the live model for two hours and every afternoon the class reconvenes to study some particular aspect of the figure, whether it be the form of the skull or the concept of negative space.  We have worked in clay and cut figures from paper, learned names and parts of the skeleton, drawn cylinders and spheres.  The ability to draw a geometrical form in any direction, from any angle, is a critical but often overlooked  aspect to beginning figure drawing.

Our group is varied in age from 17 to 60 and although we are all women we represent five different countries.  As a teacher my hope is that at the end of two weeks the students will be able to draw the human form from memory in varied stances. Drawing from the model then, with the level and degree of accuracy we hope to achieve, will enable the student to proceed on their own and improve with practice.

Wrapping up

There has been a flurry of paper flying in the digital lab as students mat their prints and make decisions on what will go into the flip files at the exhibition opening on Saturday. Painters are applying final touches and evaluating their best efforts. As the students clear out the studios there is  sadness mingled with nostalgia as they will all go their separate ways in less than a week. Many will stay in touch over the next years as they have formed important bonds but the group energy disapates as they all begin to anticipate the next step. Some will return for the fall semester and play the role of the experienced returnees advising the newcomers.  The rest go on to jobs and universities carrying a part of the Aegean Center with them.  We wish them καλό ταξίδι.  Good journeys!

Painting with Encaustic at the Aegean Center

Euphrosyne Doxiades revealed secrets about the encaustic method of painting in a recent workshop at the Aegean Center.  Encaustic is an ancient technique in which pigments and wax are blended together and applied hot to a surface. An electric hot plate kept the wax at the perfect temperature to dip into and spread with a brush. Small alcohol burners were also used to heat metal spatulas which spread the wax.  Working on a dark imprimatura the wax strokes leave a highly textured surface which can be further manipulated with heat.  Electric tools can be used as well.  The four color palette was employed; white and black, yellow and red.  Euprhosyne’s book, The Mysterious Fayum Portraits, shows how this ancient technique was used for mummy portraits in first century Egypt. Her book is published by Thames and Hudson.

The Vermeer Project: Part Two

Detail of Color Application

by Jane Morris Pack

Surprised by the ease of painting in the dark and upside down, I left the reader waiting for an update while our underpaintings dried.

The projection seems bursting with color and light inside of our dark room or ‘camera  obscura’  as is the Italian phrase.  How strange it was to apply color then and find our efforts were too garish in comparison.  Our second surprise with this project– how neutral the image needed to be.

The neutral palette

I first suggested we tint our underpainting with some generalized glazes while still outside the camera.  This gave us a sense of the general warms and cools.  The vase was glazed in a warm transparent brown very thinly applied and wiped back with a rag; the wall was tinted with a veil of blue.  In truth this glazing just barely altered the color of the painting from its monochromatic state to something resembling an old fashioned tinted photograph.

After studying Vermeer I saw that many of his tones are neutral, darks are mostly without color, half tones are very grey, and only lights have true color. This matches what we perceive of the projection.  Highlights are obviously colored yellow or blue, gradations are very soft,  contrasts are muted. Selecting a very limited palette of raw sienna and cobalt blue, with just a touch of cobalt violet (plus black and white), I matched the underpainting’s tones and scumbled on color very lightly. My application of the colors, once viewed in daylight, was too colorful.  I went back in a second time and added greys, warm and cool, softened transitions and added transparent color glazes into the darks.  The feeling of cool light this gave was more northern in feel, the greyed out colors were more photographically ‘real’. The process is somewhat demanding, light off and on, white card up, down, staring at the image, mixing color, all in the half dark.  But it goes fairly quickly nonetheless.

The students were anxious to try a portrait but we quickly discovered that a human model needs to be very still or the results are skewed.  Given fifteen minutes one can attain a likeness; more time generally results in a slumping model and a frustrated painter.

Pencil portrait

Ink portrait

Camera obscura student work 1 

This project has taught us much about the use of color, its potency if restrained in use, the use of selective focus, the beauty of grey.  I don’t think we are any closer to answering the final question of whether Vermeer painted inside of a darkened room but we have certainly understood that it would be possible to do so.

Camera obscura student work 2

The Vermeer Project

Actual Projected Image in Camera Obscura (approx. 40×48 cm / 16×19 in)

by Jane Morris Pack

Have you ever painted upside down in the dark?

While visiting Rome this winter I had the opportunity to study several Vermeer paintings in the exhibit at the Quirinale.  They were part of a larger show called “Vermeer and The Golden Age of Dutch Art”  and although there were some other fine pieces in the exhibit, the Vermeers outshone the others. They seem to glow from within and the accuracy of the perceived space is extraordinary. Johannes Vermeer has captured modern interest not only for his dreamy women engaged in mundane tasks but also perhaps due to the mystery surrounding his life.  We know little about his training, his personal life or his methods.  I was intrigued by his use of the camera obscura, which seems to be an accepted fact among art historians, and I purchased a book which discussed his use of lenses, “Vermeer’s Camera” by Philip Steadman.  This book suggests that Vermeer used a small booth type of camera which one sits in, and not the tabletop type.  I felt Steadman’s work was intriguing and it raised some questions that I wanted to investigate.

Advanced painters, those that have already done one semester with us, work on a project with me during the term. This spring I suggested we put our energies into discovering what makes Vermeer unique.  His subject matter is neither original nor particular to him. His power lies in his method.

We did some preliminary toying around with a magnifying glass and a black tent pitched over easels to get a sense of what a lens will do.  When we determined that an image could indeed be projected by that means I took the time to build a small room out of PVC pipe and covered it in cardboard and black cloth.  This served as our camera obscura. Procuring the lens was a bit more challenging but after some reading on the Internet I discovered that we needed a lens with a low number diopter and the local optician was kind enough to allow me to try many lenses until I found the one with the correct focal length.

The Beginnings of Jane’s Portable Camera Obscura Booth  (lens mounts in cardboard  behind the chair)

Once we had the lens and fixed it in place the next challenge was to see if the image could be traced easily and how one might go about painting on the tracing afterwards.  We set up the still life and used a mirror to reverse the image right to left because I thought we would need to see the real still life to paint from it at some point and the lens by itself reverses the image.  This proved unnecessary but I didn’t know that at the time.

We found that inside the booth we had a beautiful painterly projection and that the light coming from that was enough to see the palette and mix tones.  Following traditional methodology we placed five tones directly onto the imprimatura, moving from the extremes of black and white and then locating the middle three.  It was not difficult to find and apply the tones even though the image was in color but my advanced painters have had experience using the five tone range before.  We took extra time to blend edges and smooth gradations.  It is necessary to check your work against the projection occasionally which we do by turning on and off a light inside the booth.

The extraordinary discovery was that a very credible image can be made, despite working in the semi darkness, despite working on a colored, upside down image, despite the lack of a preliminary tracing.  I was thrilled to see the results, though each student had individual differences in handling and application, the paintings were all very beautiful, correct and nuanced.  The next step was to add color once our underpaintings had dried.  Again, working entirely inside the camera obscura, we mixed and applied color, both as glazes and as opaque paint.   I am waiting for our group to finish this step and then I will report again on the results.

The exhibit at the Quirinale was a chance to view paintings I may not get an opportunity to see again.  There was also an obvious fake nestled in among the real work, something a trained eye could see. It will no doubt be bought by a major museum in the near future and pass into the oeuvre of Vermeer’s genius with an appropriate exchange of millions.  But cynicism aside, the purpose of our exercise is not to make fake Vermeers.   Sitting in the dark, seeing the painterly vision of light causes nearly all to exclaim at its beauty. We learn so much about color, surface, transitions of tone and application of paint following in the footsteps of this great artist.  We have all gained immeasurably just by going through the process.