Summer is Here!

Melon & Flowers, oil on canvas, 11×14 in. – available via Michael Ingbar Gallery, 212-334-1100

It’s Memorial Day and that means summer is officially here! For artists who paint outdoors, it’s a great opportunity to get out there and capture the summer light. But that doesn’t mean studio painters can’t join in on the summer fun.

Summer offers a host of flowers and fruits that can be used to create colorful still life arrangements. Instead of relying on photographs, why not push yourself to do some painting from life? Setting up a still life is not difficult, but it does require some thought in order to come up with a balanced and harmonious subject for painting. I start by selecting a color harmony, for example, in the painting above, the complementary colors (green, purple and orange) are predominant. That is because I selected objects that were based on this color scheme in advance–I knew I wanted to paint the purple rhododendron, so I purposely selected the melon, limes and other greenery to come up with a design based on that color scheme.

Next, you have to think about the size and shape of the objects you select. I’ve chosen to work with spherical, organic forms (most fruit and flowers will fall into this category). This creates a repetition of shape and form, which serves to make the composition cohesive and filled with swirling motion. I’ve varied the sizes of the objects, which will keep things interesting and prevent the composition from becoming static. The wedges of the fruits actually help to point the viewer’s eye in the direction of the flowers and at the objects on the table, they also act as an angular balance to all the roundness.

Once you have your objects placed, set up a single light source on the arrangement and you are ready to paint. If you cannot leave your set up standing for an extended period, try working small so that you don’t have to leave it up for that long. This piece is 11×14 and was completed in one session.

So if you are looking for something new to paint this summer, why not give still life a try? It doesn’t have to be traditional or old fashioned in design, be creative and use the bold colors of summer to create something new and exciting!

Making the Most of Your Gallery Relationships

Empire State Building & Red Crane, oil on canvas, sold via Michael Ingbar Gallery

If you are represented by a gallery, you need to work WITH them in order to make the most of the relationship. While this may seem obvious, in today’s world of Internet sales, many artists make the mistake of actually competing with their galleries.

I’ve seen artists who offer their work for sale directly from their web sites at a discount (sometimes up to 50%!) from retail. This is a terrible way to do business. In doing so, the artist is practically guaranteeing that their work will not increase in value and that discounting will be expected in the future by collectors. Also, how can a gallery possibly compete with a pricing that does not factor in their commission?

Artists need to realize that having a well-established gallery behind them is worth its weight in gold. I work with 4 commercial galleries in New York City, Philadelphia, New Hope, PA and Naples, FL.  Each of them provides me with a much broader reach to prospective collectors than I could ever manage on my own. Additionally, they provide credibility–having your work marketed by a reputable gallery says “this work has our stamp of approval”, that is worth a lot to a prospective collector.

So, how do you make the most of your gallery relationships? Here is what has worked for me:

- Keep your pricing consistent among the galleries as well as with any sales you make directly from your studio.

- Give the galleries your retail price and allow them some leeway (typically 10%) to discount without having to notify you first (any additional discounting of course must be discussed individually).

- Promote the work you have in the galleries on your website, blog and Facebook page, and list the gallery contact information for each specific piece rather than having prospective collectors contact you directly. You have to make up your mind–are you in the direct sales business or are you a represented artist?

- Stay current with your inventory, send the gallery JPEGs of your new paintings as soon as they are completed and list them on your Facebook page and other online venues along with the gallery contact info.

- Discuss joint marketing efforts with your galleries, be sure they have the info they need to list your work on THEIR online pages as well.

- Promote their events even if you are not taking part in them–by doing so you are driving traffic to their shops and someone might ask about your work even if it is not in that specific exhibit.

Making a living in this business is not easy, but it is much easier if you work with the people that can help you rather than against them!

Paint What YOU Feel Like Painting

Pastel Sketch of Naples Florida for possible future painting, 5×7 in.

I’ve had a busy month–demos, workshops, new series to complete for a new gallery, major student exhibit, etc. Right now, I feel like painting something new and different. So I am.

I’ve decided to try a new series of paintings of Naples, FL. I am rerpesented there by a wonderful gallery, Trudy Labell Fine Art, and I would like to work more closely with them to gain exposure in the Southeast. Up until now, I’ve always exhibited my NY urban landscapes and flower paintings at the gallery. I’m hoping they will be interested in my new idea. However, even if they aren’t, I’m still enjoying myself painting something that interests ME! I could never be the type of artist who paints purely for commercial purposes. There are too many offbeat subjects that interest me visually–traffic, run down buildings, laundry, dirty dishes, etc. I don’t care so much about “what” I’m painting, as I am not a narrative painter. Visual patterns and textures are more interesting to me than telling a story, therefore, I can find interesting things to paint just about anywhere.

Also, I believe when we paint things that truly interest us, we do our best work. Therefore, prospective collectors who really connect with a painter’s message, won’t be put off just because the subject is slightly out of the norm.

I’ve always followed my instincts when it comes to choosing a subject and have never regretted it. As a professional, of course sales are important to me, but I would rather paint a painting that might not sell than pass up an opportunity to explore a subject or medium that truly excites me.

Come and See the Show!

Exhibition of paintings and pastels by my students at the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey, May 4 through July 1

I am really proud of the hard work my students have put into the exhibition we are having of paintings and pastels at the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey! The show is on display now through July 1, and on Friday, May 11, there will be a reception from 6 to 8 pm.

Everyone put forth their best effort to make this exhibit a success! Each artist who participated created a new piece specifically for the show. There are 44 artists exhibiting, media includes oil, acrylic, pastel and mixed media. The subjects and styles are incredibly diverse, but the show holds together very well due to the standardized format of a 12×12 square for paintings or a 16×16 in. framed format for the pastels.

I hope you can make it to the art center to see the exhibit live and meet some of the artists. There are 3 other exhibits opening that night at the center, so it should be a fun and lively evening. Hope to see you there!

The Visual Arts Center of NJ is located at 68 Elm Street, Summit, NJ. For more info, visit www.artcenternj.org or call 908-273-9121.

Make the Most Out of Your Plein Air Experience – Enjoy Yourself!

Waving to the brigade of NYC fire trucks that passed by during my demo on the Salmagundi balcony, with plein air, you have to just go with the flow.
Photo credit: Joel Graham

This past Saturday, I did a live plein air demo on the balcony of the Salmagundi Club on 5th Avenue in NYC. The demo was videotaped and fed directly into the Club’s parlor room where attendees watched on a large projection screen. The title of my demo was called “Fearless Painting: Plein Air on the Streets of NY” and the purpose was to help take some of the anxiety out of painting in a very public place.

The main idea that I tried to get across was that with urban plein air, you have very little control over your surroundings–lots of distractions in the form of curious onlookers, vehicles, street noise and unexpected events like the brigade of fire trucks that happened to come screaming down 5th Avenue during my demo with their sirens blaring. Because you can’t control what is going on around  you, you have to stay focused on what you are doing and why you are doing it. Hopefully, you choose to paint plein air because you enjoy it, or at least because you like the idea of capturing your subject quickly and want to improve your observation skills by working from life. Plein air is a great way to produce studies that you can later use in your studio paintings. Avoiding it simply because you are afraid of it means you are missing out on an opportunity to hone your skills and build confidence as a painter.

How do you get over that fear? A couple things can help:

• First, as I said, remember why you are doing it–it is not necessarily to create a master piece, but rather to improve your seeing skills in terms of seeing color, form, value, proportion and perspective. You are doing this for YOU, not for anyone else, so don’t worry what any onlookers may think. They will eventually move on and not even remember that they stopped to look at what you were doing.
• Second, be organized. Work with a limited palette and don’t bring  more than you need. You can paint discreetly or simply just sketch. If you are just sketching in charcoal, pastel, pencil or marker, you don’t need an easel. You can sit in a cafe or on a park bench and no one will even notice what you are doing.
• Try to position yourself so that your back is against some sort of obstacle such as a tree, building or wall. People cannot look over your shoulder if you do this, they have to approach you head on, and that is harder to do. If they should come up to you, take the initiative and greet them. It will catch them off guard. Introduce yourself and be friendly, odds are they will be a bit taken aback and leave you alone after a minute of polite conversation.
• Keep a few sketches you are proud of on hand, or a business card with some of your work on it. That way, you can show them what your work looks like finished, it will also serve to make YOU more confident by having something to show them that you are proud of. Who knows, you might even find that you have a new collector!

Plein air painting, even in an urban setting, does not have to be intimidating. Relax, have fun, and remember you are there for YOU not for anyone else, enjoy yourself!

Plein Air Demo at Salmagundi – April 28

I hope you will join me for my plein air demo this Saturday from 1:30 to 3:30 pm at the Salmagundi Club. Watch from the comfort of the parlor room via live video feed as I paint 5th Avenue looking north from the balcony. Call the Club at 212-255-7740 for more information. Hope to see you there.

Art Takes Times Square

Detail from Taxi, acrylic on board

I almost never participate in art competitions, but this one caught my eye, mainly because it is located in NYC and gives the winners an opportunity to have their work shown on the billboards around Times Square. I will not spend lots of energy promoting my participation in this, my collectors and students will not receive hordes of repeat spam from me asking for their votes.  Instead, I’ve chosen to post my link and try my luck.  Here is a link to the work I have in the competition, you can “Collect Me” if you like what you see: http://annekullaf.artistswanted.org/atts2012

Also, if you are a New York area artist, and your work seems suited to this venue, you might want to give it a try. Good luck to all!

Spring Cleaning – Sketches & Studies For Sale Online Until the End of April

Magnolia - plein air pastel study

Anyone who paints professionally and teaches creates a lot of work that they probably never do much with. It’s just part of the process–you practice, you create studies for larger works and you do demos–how much of this type of work can you store?

I normally don’t sell my work online. Most work sold online is offered at prices well below what professionals sell their work for in galleries. I primarily sell my work in galleries, on rare occasions, I might sell a study or demo to one of my students, but that’s about it. This spring, I decided to try something for a short period of time. Until the end of April, I’m offering my plein air sketches, a few still lifes, and some demos for sale directly. All are originals (I don’t make prints of my work), and of the same quality as the work I sell in galleries. The only difference is that they are unframed, and many are in pastel, which is a medium I don’t typically offer for sale in gallery exhibitions. I’ve priced them from $75 up to about $300, depending on size and the support they are on (more for larger works on canvas or board, less for smaller works on paper, however nothing is larger than 11×14 in.).

I have sold a nice variety of these to people who normally would not have the budget to purchase my oil paintings. In terms of subject, most are traditional plein air landscapes or still lifes.You might find one or 2 urban studies in pastel, but these I typically reserve as thank you gifts for the collectors who buy my large oil or acrylic paintings. I also retain them to use as references when I am working on my large studio paintings.

If you are interested in browsing through the works I have for sale, you can see them here. I will be adding new ones as I do them or find them in my studio as I continue to do my spring cleaning. However, I will only have this “sale” on until the end of April, so if you see something you like, best to buy it now.

Keeping it real…(and I’m not talking about painting style)

Detail of a current work in progress, oil on canvas

There is a glut of artwork on Facebook, it seems to have become THE PLACE for artists to share and promote their work. It’s free, accessible and easy to use, of course it comes with its drawbacks like tons of spam and having your name added to groups that you don’t want to be added to, but it can be a helpful marketing tool and means to get exposure for your work if you teach and/or exhibit and sell your work professionally. So, how do you get your work noticed? Here is what I find attracts me most to the artists whose work I regularly follow. I’m not a groupie, but I do know good work when I see it and the work I enjoy does have some common threads:

Keep it real.

With all the work being shown on Facebook, I find that there is only a handful of artists whose work I regularly notice and pay any attention to. The work that stands out is unique, original and consistent. It has a clear message and the artist’s hand is obvious in the work.  I know just from the thumbnail that shows up in my newsfeed who the artist is (without seeing their name) and that I am going to be rewarded with something interesting if I click on the link. While the majority of work that falls into this category for me is abstract, there are several representational artists who have taken their work to exciting levels because of its content, not just because they know how to draw and paint. I also find that photographers are very adept at originality, particularly those who have a keen eye for design and composition.

Don’t just follow the crowd.

Conversely, there is a horde of work out there that all looks the same–technically proficient (for the most part), yet lacking in originality. In a recent post, a friend referred to it as “so what?” art, I love that term, because that is exactly how I feel when I see it, so what?!

I recently received a promotional email that featured an interesting “test” where you had to match the artists names to their work, the idea was more interesting than the actual test! While the work shown was top notch in terms of skill, and the artists featured are all well known professionals in their field, I was amazed at how similar all of the paintings looked! I couldn’t possibly have matched the artists to the paintings. That was a revelation to me, it really made me appreciate those artists whose work I see on Facebook and recognize immediately as theirs. They have taken the time to develop their hand and creative eye to a level that their unique vision shines through every time. That is what I want to see when I’m looking at art.

The artists whose work interests me covers a range of styles and media: abstract, representational, photography and 3-dimensional. Most are professionals, but some are new to the game and their talent and creativity shine through  nonetheless.  Most are not as popular as the Facebook “stars”, but that doesn’t matter, good work never goes unnoticed  for very long!

Urban Plein Air – Keep it Simple

View from the South Balcony, Salmagundi Club, 47 5th Avenue, NYC - acrylic, 8x10 in.

If you are going to paint in the city, whether it’s NY, Boston, Philadelphia or even London or Paris, you need to be organized, plan ahead and take a minimal amount of supplies. I am fortunate that the Salmagundi Club, the oldest arts club in the US, allows me to paint on their balcony–giving me access to water, bathrooms and when the dining room is open, coffee and snacks! However, on days that I have painted in the parks or other areas of the city, I have to plan my route and research the place I will be painting ahead of time to ensure that I will be able to work comfortably and for the most part, undisturbed.

What Makes an Ideal Location

Well, besides having a view of something you really want to paint, simple things like shelter, access to a bathroom and close proximity to public transportation. By shelter, I mean a place where you can paint with your back to something like a wall or tree, so that you don’t have an audience of onlookers lingering while you work. I teach and do lots of demos, having people watch when I’m doing a demo is fine, but when I’m painting, that’s my time and I don’t want to be disturbed. If people have to approach you head on, they are less likely to stand there and expect to chat. I also use the direct approach, if I see someone coming who looks like they are interested in what I am doing, I smile at them say hello and wish them a good day. I will give them a glimpse of what I am doing and then excuse  myself to get back to it before the light changes, most people will move on.  I also keep a stack of business cards with me and direct them to the galleries I work with to see more of my paintings if they are located near where I am painting.

What Makes an Ideal Kit

For me, the simpler the better. I am used to working with a very limited palette, so I try to limit the number of colors I take with me regardless of medium. For oils or acrylics I try to limit it to about 6 or 7 tubes of paint, I can actually get by with 4 if I have to (3 primaries and a tube of white).  I select the colors based on the type of landscape I will be painting. For example, if I am going to be painting in a city park, I’ll take 2 yellows and 2 blues so I can get a nice range and variety of greens. If I’m in an area with a lot of brick buildings, I’ll take 2 reds and 2 yellows so I can make interesting terra cotta type colors. For example, the palette I used on the painting above was: Prussian blue, ultramarine, alizarin, cadmium red, cad yellow medium, cad yellow light and titanium white. I selected it ahead of time because I know the area and knew which colors I would need for some of the main elements–the green awnings, the greys of the stonework and the pinks of the flowering trees.

What About an Easel?

If I am sketching in pastel, I usually don’t bother with an easel. I just use an old canvas board (with one of my oil or acrylic demos on one side) and tape my paper to the back. This works well if you really want to travel light. If I am actually using paint (oil  or acrylic), then I like to have an easel. I have used both French easels and aluminum types. The French easels are nice and stable but way too heavy to carry around the city. Aluminum is ok, but a little shaky on uneven ground or if it is windy. I just ordered a new plein air system from Coulter, I will write a review of it after it arrives and I’ve had time to try it out.

Meanwhile, take advantage of the spring weather and get outside to paint whenever you can. Don’t be shy, the more you do it, the easier it gets. Hopefully the tips above will make it a little less stressful.