Learning from the Masters

Learning or copying from the Masters was always a valid exercise and at art school it was hated, boooooring! What can you learn apart from the obvious, style, touch, handling, palette yes of course but perhaps something even more useful! Fudging! How to hide or cover up the tricky bits! Let’s take a peek at Vermeer. 

If we take a peek at the Wiki Commons photo of  ''the Artist  in his Studio'' you get an idea of what Vermeer didn’t like painting. Although an expert in the genre of interiors and linear perspective, I suspect Vermeer was not too fond of painting chairs. Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem but if you specialise in interiors it is! To be quite honest chairs are tricky to paint, regardless how you tackle them legs and surfaces always seem to read wrong. Vermeer’s approach is to show you the upper part as you can see here on the left or the whole caboodle hidden behind the easel on the right. He hides chairs behind drapery, under clothing, halfway behind a doorway or depicts them face on. In The Wine Glass we get a fabulous 3/4 view but apart from that they are usually ''fudged'' in some way (tables too!).Look at the stool the artist is sitting on too, the legs are placed in deep shadow so as not to attract attention. Similarly we should really be seeing the left leg of the easel appearing near to the artist's left foot but nope Vermeer has selectively ''fudged'' it away.  

One of the things artists love to cheat on is hands, hands are notoriously tricky, you either end up with big bunches of bananas or strange alien shaped extremities (cartoon figures usually only have four digits because of this problem), Vermeer has got no fear of hands ...... feet are his problem! Here once again the left foot is hidden behind a rung on the stool  (the foreshortening on that left foot is difficult) and the right foot is conveniently lost in shadows on the right. Those red stockings were important, they cost a bomb, so he had to feature those but the shoes naaah! For someone who loved painting ladies, he was fortunate that fashion dictated long skirts and the men he hides in shadows or again behind some draped table or fudged chair. We do get the odd naked foot but even there it’s just a peek. 

I love Vermeer but I must admit once I noticed these foibles I can’t ''unsee'' them! Once again a public domain image of '' The Music Lesson'', here we've got the hidden chair, draped table and no feet! 

Painting was and still is like photoshop, another valuable lesson to be learned from the Masters! How to fudge like a pro.