The Self-Isolation Residency 14th April 2020: Day 16

I feel like today has been quite a productive day as far as the painting is concerned, letting it dry a little for the last couple of days was definitely the right decision. Depending on how wet certain areas are I could see me finishing it tomorrow. It has now reached the point of adding the detail, although I will say here and now that I really don't intend to add too much fine detail.

Detail can be the worst enemy of the painter, so many students and painters think that adding all the  fine detail that they can says so much about the subject, others of course think that adding fine detail shows their skill as a painter, both opinions are on the whole wrong. The real trick with detail comes in knowing what to put in and perhaps more importantly, what to leave out. Too much detail tends to weigh down a painting, to overload the observer with information, the subtly of just using enough detail to transmit an idea, and that is of course what painters are doing at the end of the day, is far more effective than painting every eyelash on a 2 inch tall figure. The same can be said about the artist who tries to show off their technical skills by including finer and finer details. It actually shows a much greater level of materials control and self assurance to be able to just 'suggest' the traits of an object of a person with a few deft flicks of the brush than to spend a lifetime adding details that in the final analysis are not noticed by the observer in their appreciation of the piece.

As far as my painting is concerned I will be concentrating more of the details of highlights and shadow to try to bring it too life. These are important details, they give a believably to the subject, even if it is semi-abstract. Highlights and shadows give objects weight and gravity, we know the relationship between objects and the world by the way light reflects off a surface and proximity of objects by the  they cast shadows. We don't need to be great artists to 'read' how these things work in a painting, it fact if we consciously read them they are probably not done well. When we look at a painting and 'believe' it without question or knowing why, then the painter has done their job well.