Stages of the portrait

I'm painting using a very old method here. The portrait started with a Grisalle (black and white) using acrylic rather than oils to make the process move faster. You can paint in an almost photographic manner in black and white. That wasn't my intention here.



The next step is to apply the oils with a layer of sepia colour over the black and white work. I chose umber mixed with ochre jaune and a touch of cadmium red. It was a dominant tone in the composition and worked with the skin colours. As soon as the sepia is added the painting begins to look alive. The colour and the values of the black and white work make it look very dynamic. It's an illusion that only the artist will experience because of the amount of time they spend in front of the work. There is a lot more to do.



Straight away I began working in the background colour which effects how you see everything. Then the highlights in the skin are particularly important. The mid tones are basicly the sepia. Using cadmium rouge and blue with a touch of cadmium yellow for the cheeks and shadow areas (a touch more blue there). The griselle still shows through and gives all the colours a value and the shapes a dimension.



A few days later and many layers of colour have begun to add up to the completed painting. I corrected a few elements in the composition. The underpainting seems to have completely disappeared but if you look closely you can see areas where the colour receives it's value from the work beneath.



A close up of the portrait. The sunlight makes the wet paint reflective so it's not exactly as you see it here. It will be a few weeks before it is completly dry.

Latest portrait

I'll be posting more information about this painting and the stages involved in creating it. It's a commission for a family in Paris.

Back from Ireland

Hi
I just got back from Ireland yesterday. It was a nice few days visiting some of my family and seeing Dublin. I think my wife is happiest there but she couldn't come with me this time. I also visited the GOAL ball, charity event in the Burlington hotel, where I donated a piece of art for public auction.

So I've finished up the the ile Saint Louis gallery and am back to doing my own paintings, thank goodness. It's been a while and I've been missing it very much. The gallery experience was very good for learning about marketing and the hard work that goes into promotion and setting up shows. There's a lot to any business involved in the arts, when it is done well but this was particularly demanding as I was doing everything myself.

It's very good to be out of there now and planning my own working exhibitions and events. I'm still working with other artists and promoting people that I believe in.

I'm organising drawing with the human model in a large atelier in the 6th of Paris and that is proving popular with very interesting and intelligent people attending. It averages between 16 and 26 people per session. The models are fantastic. Super professional.

There's information about that here on my site:
http://www.tjbyrne.com/newslettersubscr.html

If you are interested and have any questions, feel free to post them here.

Des Femmes - Exposition & Vernissage

Laura Stevens is an English artist and photographer. She lives in Paris but travels all over the world on photographic assignments.


Laurence Dugas-Fermon. A french actress, model and photographic artist whose images are simply breathtaking.


Julie Coustarot, an employee of the "Maison Europeene de la photographie" in Paris. She studied 'history of art', then gained a degree in photography in Lyon.

The next exhibition promises to be very impressive. It's next Tuesday 3rd of May in Paris. There are 3 artists, two French and one English, all women, they bring their considerable creative talents together for the first time in the Greenlane Gallery. It seems to me that their art communicates poetic, romantic, dark & mysterious aspects of the human spirit.
Their exhibition consists of photography and video installations.
It's titled "Des Femmes" and runs from the 2nd to the 8th May.

The vernissage/opening is on Tuesday, 3rd of May. 18.30h - 20h

I'll introduce you if you turn up.

The address is, the Greenlane Gallery, Paris.
29 rue des deux ponts, ile Saint Louis, 75004, Paris, France

Metro: Pont Marie / Saint-Paul

Recent portrait

During the renovations it's been a breath of fresh air to have the gallery closed for the last couple of weeks.

The creative juices are flowing and I'm focused on my own work. I'm organising life drawing in a much larger venue and considering teaching painting and drawing methods.

Here's a commission I had this week. It's a spiritual guru from the USA and apparently this will be presented to him this coming Thursday 24th of March.



I had only a week to do it so I worked in a new medium which replaces acrylic. It's slower drying, made from soja, so there is no petroleum base. Naturally I was working from a photo so it's the way he appears there and I don't know the man. The colour and the energy of the piece are pretty good and I think he'll be happy with it. I do like it. The original has a nice glow and the colours are spectacular. Impossible to capture in a photo.

It always blows me away after I've completed a portrait. The fact that he's a spiritual person made a difference to the way I painted him.

Joined at the hip

I was playing around with some drawings and came up with this.
It's just interesting, n'est pas?
They are two seperate drawings done at the same time, of the same model.
& they join one another perfectly in terms of perspective etc.

Salon du Dessin, Paris 2011

Interested in drawing as an art form?

There is a salon of drawings in Paris from March 30th. It's a big exhibition with a lot of art collectors, galleries and dealers attending.

If you would like to join me and a group of other artists and collectors, just send me an email and I'll add you to the mailing list with all the details of time and place.

email: tj@tjbyrne.com

Or you can just go on your own. Here's the website of the Salon.
http://www.salondudessin.com

New Venue-Life Drawing in Paris 2011

I've been hosting life drawing on the ile saint Louis, 75004 Paris for more than a year and have a very loyal and talented group of artists who draw the model with me but the space we've been using is too small to continue there.

So it's time to bite the bullet and move to a larger venue.

The new location is in the 6eme of Paris, near the Pont Alexandre III. It's in a very large artists atelier which is owned by a friend of mine.

The model this week is excellent, Laurence, a female model that I've worked with many times before. The sessions are each friday, from 2pm - 5pm.

To be included with those, invited to attend, please sign up to the life drawing newsletter. You'll receive an invite, once a week, with all the details, including which model, price and what equipment etc.

This is the new venue.

See you there :)

Paris 75006

Snobbery, my subconscious says............

Good morning, I woke up with this thought and unless I write it down, I'll toss and turn all night. So I apologise in advance for inflicting it upon you. If you think that you suffer from snobbery, this may offend your sensibilities and I request that you turn back now and read no more.


My subconscious says:

Snobbery is born of: Ignorance, ineptitude & isolation.

i.i.i

Ignorance of the people or philosophy which is disdained.

Ineptitude towards the culture.

Isolation from the culture.

In effect a snobbish person is a crippled person, incapable of making contact with others on a purely human level. It is born of isolation, often from birth, by cultural norms which make no reference to the root causes of the norms.

So their point of reference becomes narrow in certain areas. Their brains never have the opportunity to fully develop reference points for certain actions and motivations, which are normal in a human being.

Their behaviour becomes modeled by the mature cultural structures which already exist within their artificial peer group. Like a crutch.

Imagine a child which never plays with other children but who is surrounded by adults.

With no reference to the root motivations which the adult culture is based upon, the person simply follows the preexisting rules and finds it difficult to step outside of the social bounderies within which they are constrained, because they do not have the points of reference necessary, emotionally/mentally/at a primitive level.

Points of reference which the brain requires, in order to fully develope. Hence, they are crippled, unless they can acquire the mental reference points, born of experience. This may be done through imaginatively reliving an experience. Such as reimagining their childhood while in a deeply suggestive mental state, or spending a lot of time with young children of a dramatically different culture.

"Dignité" at l'hotel de Ville de Paris

The vernissage of "Dignité" at l'hotel de Ville de Paris. These rooms are only used on special occassions and they are incredibly beautiful.

The exhibition is well worth visiting. Take your time, read the descriptions, put them in context and put yourself in the place of the people there.

The exhibition of photos runs until the 3rd of July.



Another view of the impressive architecture & decoration.
The walls are covered in magnificent paintings.

The artist who invited me, Guillaume Herbaut. His subject was Mexico. Shocking what is happening there. He risks his life to get the stories and photos. Some of the people he has interviewed made great sacrifices to communicate with us, to anyone outside of their environment.

Lack of education is one of the biggest hurdles there.

La Cafeotheque

You are invited to an informal exhibition of paintings of Paris and surreal paintings from the dreams of the artist, Tom J. Byrne.

The exhibition runs from the 17th of April and continues untill the 12th of May, 2010.

The venue is the best coffee shop in Paris. It's an informal atmosphere and the staff are friendly and happy to discuss the art. Occassionally Tom J. Byrne can be found there drawing the people who come to visit the exhibition and sample the coffee.

For more information on the venue, read Oliver Strand's recent piece in the NY times, here, http://tinyurl.com/yhxcpez

Art competitions

I'm running the Greenlane gallery, on the ile saint Louis, in Paris. Following some comments by artists regarding competitions I made the following response:

I've looked into the idea of promoting the gallery and finding new artists by opening up a competition where the winner (only one) gets a two week solo show.

I have to say that having looked into the process, with the intention of doing it well, that the amount of work involved is daunting. The costs are not negligible and that is on top of the normal costs of running a gallery.

In the normal course of things, running a gallery, even badly, is expensive. To run a gallery well you need a team of people, someone manning the gallery, someone looking for collectors and dealing with journalists and someone marketing the gallery online and in real life. You need to know and be on good terms with a lot of journalists, collectors and artists.

Having been an artist for over 25 years, when I took over the management I was shocked by how much work it demanded. Since then I've produced a dribble of art rather than the flow I had before. However I've learnt a great deal and it has changed my mind entirely about what it is that a gallery is and what it does.

Too many people who have gone through art school and artists in general are educated to think, that it's simply a shop where they sell art. That's an incredibly inaccurate description. If that were the case, people would just open their own shop.

In fact, I recommend that. An artists collective which runs a gallery would be a very healthy experience.

Savvy art article-NY, How to collect art

NYC magazine, Savvy, published a piece which I wrote this morning (east coast time). It's about how to colect art. Have a read of it here.

http://www.24savvy.com/articles/01-07-2010/savvy-art-buying-believe-it-or-not-youre-expert

Here's the original article I wrote:

Art is driven like the clothes business, by fashion. But art, whether it be paintings, film, photography or sculpture, outlasts fashion. Fashion is a churning beast which survives by consuming itself. It's a bad guide for art. Ignore what's popular because it won't be tomorrow. If you are buying art for investment you are always thinking with regard to the future. The best way to understand the future is to relate to the past.

The art that lasts, is the art that touches the human in us. The art that makes us reflect or vibrate. The art that can transfer it's vibration to us. It's the existence of the human in the work that vibrates with us. That vibration is of extraordinary value. The primitive. The human touch. Even Leonardos Mona Lisa is a primitive combination of earth pigments ground and mixed with mediums such as egg, oils and water.

All of that sounds pretentious. How can you relate that to the, day to day and find art of value? Well in short, buy the art that appeals to you. The art which you like, which does not require a story to prop it up. If the story is lost then the work looses it's connection to you and others, so don't let yourself be convinced by a smooth talking gallery owner. Allow yourself to see, not just with your eyes but with your heart, your lungs. Allow yourself to drink in the art.

Then apply your intellect. Start to calculate. Ask yourself about the artist. Ask about their history. It doesn't really matter if they have been to art college. Especially now, when they don't usually teach anything of substance. Your guide to the value of the work is whether the artist is driven. That's what will tell you whether they will continue to be driven. Will this artist continue to experiment. Will they make a mark. Will they inspire other artists. Are they a chapter in the history of art. Are they even a page? Are they sincere?

And if the answer to all these questions is no, yet the work appeals to you, you have still found a piece of art. Not an investment of course but art and art has a value in your life which goes beyond the surplus of coins that flow from the slot machine on the last day of your life.

Some people might remember us by that mass of coin. That slush fund they can cash in on or measure us by. None of that matters to us when we have finished living. The only thing that matters, ultimately, is the vibration of life we attune ourselves to while alive. Live like that and buy art like that and you'll find art that has value and will have value in the future.

Naughty or nice

Happy new year
Hope all went well over the holidays and that the dreaded grip didn't get ya.

A cold got me but I'm using it to great benefit. Time for reflection and contemplation. I'm bed bound, plus my voice has gone all husky, which has a nice effect on my wife :)

Crossroads

OH! what to do?
I find myself at a crossroads!

Recent drawings on the metro

I've been doing a lot of metro journeys and rather than read I've been drawing. It really gives a lot of people pleasure to see me drawing on the train. I'm amazed by how friendly they get when they spot what I'm doing.

Sometimes the subject notices I'm doing their portrait but generally not. Other times people have mistakenly assumed I was drawing them, when in fact I was drawing the person beside or behind them. It's surprising how often they would like to see what I've done. Children are particularly interested.

Women are funny though. There have been a few times when I've been doing their portraits and either they have asked for my card or they have simply passed me their phone number. Hilarious when that happens because I'm not the most attractive of guys, especially by Parisian standards. None the less I take it as a compliment and always pass it to the bloke that looks like he needs it the most. I'm married :)

Here are a few of the recent sketches from November and December 09. I get about 3 minutes or perhaps a little longer to draw these so there's nothing too finished.

Snow and portraits

Hi
It's snowing in Paris. Lovely but it means a total go slow. I'm not feeling very inspired anyway. There seems to be very little feedback, whether it be good or bad from people regarding arts these days. I'm not going to try to do anything for a few weeks. I'm just ging to go with the flow and see what does or doesn't happen.

I've been enjoying drawing people on the metro. Will post a few drawings of them here later. I've also been doing more portraits in oils. That's come to an end for the moment. I won't do any more commissions till January at the earliest. In fact, I think that I'll concentrate on Gravure. I've been missing my friends in the engraving group for some time now and thanks to the fact that I'll be handing the gallery over to someone else in January I'll be free to get back to that. Running the gallery has been so incredibly time consuming. Very interesting of course and I learnt a lot but so many other things that are important took a back seat as a result. What I learnt is invaluable though. It has given me a totally new outlook on art and the art world.

Here are some of the portraits I've done this week. Neither is finished and both were executed very quickly. I'll finish them off later. Oddly enough I've found that instead of speeding up through doing the portrait sessions, in fact I've slowed down. Great way to get to know people though.

Portraits for free - 2

It's been a week since I posted the notice about portraits for free and so far I've done several. There are 3 more planned for this week. After this I'll start looking for a location in Paris where I can work in natural daylight so a nice atelier in a good location would be good.

Here are a few of the paintings so far. 3 hours each which is pretty fast but there's no underpainting or drawing. I just go straight in with the paint.

Portraits for free.

I'm painting portraits for free in the gallery at the moment. If you are interested in coming along send me a message, phone or email. There are only a few days left this week. Most of next week is free. I'll give you the details when you get in contact.

December Exhibition in Paris

The opening night went well. I'm still a bit knackered by it all.
Here are a few pics from last friday. Thanks to Jean-Michel Volat for the marvelous photos.