Thursday Feb 28, Mar 7, 14, 21 from 6:00-8:00 PM.
Acrylic 102 with Rob Fairburn:
Using technology to improve your painting
Over the next 4 weeks, we will take a look at how technology has helped artists improve their work throughout history, and we will explore ways modern technology can help us improve our painting.
Week 1. Supercomputer in our pocket
“Since the technology of electronics has become such an important part of modern life, it is inevitable that it be employed in the creation of art.”
—Ben Laposky, 1969
Today we will look at several basic functions of all smart phones that can help us look at our work in a different light. We will create compositions of a single item still life.
-Using the led to light subjects.
-using the black and white function to help determine values
-taking a step back and looking at composition as a whole, in pictures.
Week 2. Projectors. Working small to work big
“A bit of advice, don't copy nature too closely. Art is an abstraction; as you dream amid nature, extrapolate art from it, and concentrate on what you will create as a result.”
—Paul Gauguin
Vermeer used a whole host of technological aids to make paintings that would have been impossible at the time to make without them.
Today we will discuss the importance of carrying a sketch pad, and make small drawings. We will transfer those drawings to larger canvases with a projector, and paint them using techniques we learned last week.
Week 3. Photo editing apps
“In my mind, the creative aspects of science and art involve many of the same 'how, why, and what' questions. Both disciplines deal with theories, set up problems, experiment with possibilities and help us understand the world we live in.”
—Karen Guzak
This week we will bring in poor source photos and edit them into better source material with basic photo apps. We will paint from our phones and make small studies of our edited work.
Homework: find some source materials... take some pictures. Use the previous info that we have learned, light them, edit them, and print them. Use those as source material to make study drawings. Bring in the prints and the drawings.
Week 4.
“What is possible in art becomes thinkable in life.”
—Brian Eno
This week we will combine all of the knowledge we have learned so far, painting an original composition, put together by you.