First post - mission statement

Back of a woman's neck

oil on canvas
24 x 20
2011

Hello All (which is nobody so far) but I just set this up this evening. I would like to use this blog to try out some ideas, namely sharing drawing and oil painting methods and techniques that I have learned and continue to learn and have taught and continue to teach. I am an instructor at Studio Incamminati in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and have been heavily involved both as student and teacher in this atelier type setting since 2002. The methods of Studio Incamminati are largely handed down by the schools founder Nelson Shanks, yet we have also brought in outside instructors who have expertise in different areas to help round out the curriculum such as Jon DeMartin and Dan Thompson, and occasionally others such as Michael Grimaldi, Anthony Ryder, Ted Seth Jacobs and Robert Liberace to name a few. The schools goal is to be a training ground for acquiring and mastering old master techniques. There are number of these schools popping up around the country as realist art has been making a comeback in the last twenty years, these include Grand Central Academy and Janus Collaborative both in NYC, and quite a number more across the country, in Canada and also across the pond such as Florence Academy in Italy. These are the only ones I can name off the top of my head as I only loosely keep track of them, although we all keep one eye on one another as each school has its strengths and philosophies of method and I imagine an unspoken competition with each other. I plan to focus not so much on a biography of the different schools or even Studio Incamminati, but more of a loose running dialog and explanation of drawing and painting methods as I understand them and how they relate to what I am working on in the studio or when working from the model at the school. The reason for doing this is the seed was sown in me a few years back that with all the expertise and understanding I have acquired thus far I could potentially write a book. Then more recently it was mentioned to me that writing a blog could be a good way to start the process and help generate ideas that may one day create the foundation of a book. I could easily, right now, write a how-to book on painting or drawing, but there are plenty of those already and many of them pretty god awful. If I were to do it I would want it to be a standard for a generation, at least that would be the goal. But what that kind of book would look like is going to take exploration and vision. So.... we shall see how it goes. If nothing else hopefully it will be fun, informative and will expand my community.

Since we are artists and visual people I plan to include plenty of photos of my drawings and paintings at various stages, occasionally some of my students work, work of my collegues and anything else that helps to get the point across. Am I promoting myself, well, yes, but the main focus is promoting teaching and better understanding of drawing and painting principles and methods and how to best communicate these ideas to students interested in learning.

Ceramic bowl on plywood
oil on canvas
16 x 16
2011