An Introduction Pt.1

In searching for a way to teach my students portraiture and the human figure, I found out I was dealing with an issue beyond the basic elements of art. I discovered in my search that relationship is the “constant” in art work between: form, color, and values which are different in every painting. Each artwork is a separate world, I came to realize that I couldn’t use the same formula for every portrait or painting, however, I always had to look for a way to make the painting work and that meant that the relationship of form, values (light and shadows) and color had to create a unique harmony and order in the space designated by the canvas. It is in the feeling I get from the painting that I can tell if relationship is there or not.

When I paint, colors are talking to me and they direct the path toward the end being pursued. Of course, all elements are indispensable for painting. For example, color is vibration, like all that exists in the universe and it talks to you through feeling. Form depends on space, but space doesn’t need form to exist. Ultimately they are both relative but I deal with both in a painting. Connected to the concept of space, there is one invisible element- time- which is abstract and paradoxical.

Creativity emerges in the most elusive element: time- the present moment. The past and the future are abolished in the creative act, you are immersed in a state of Being. When one is submerged like this in the painting one is not aware of the emptiness arising, it is a sublime moment in which one flows. It happens without you noticing, you fall into that magical moment. The artist needs the space in a canvas to paint and inner space, emptiness, a meditative state in our mind for creativity to emerge. Since all is vibration, there is an energy exchange between the artist and his canvas This is the healing element of art, as the soul enjoys a state of being joined with everything that exists. “That” which is unknown suddenly surfaces and the relationship I am seeking occurs in the canvas.

One, as the creator, has the power to make lines, forms, shapes, colors, harmonize in that certain “order” created on a canvas. Actually, in portraiture a strange triad occurs in the relationship created between the subject, the artist and the canvas. The student needs to learn how to see differently, this is, instead of fragmenting and separating the parts to be drawn and painted, the student needs to see in a most total way: model, cloth, background, all together, blended and only in terms of values, shadows and lights….The artist could use this understanding so that paintings are whole, complete, total.