Mystery, the fantastic, ambiguousity. What does inspire your thoughts and feelings?

Art needs to evoke a response, and play a part in a dialogue. It is about communication. Painting is so often a lonely work (maybe necessarily so), and the opportunities to meet the viewers are few. To me, my painting tends to feel like a monologue except during exhibitions, while what I aim for is the dialogue, the touching of minds and emotions. The internet opens up good opportunities to meet, thankfully.

"Chess", (see larger Chess in this link) is an unusal painting from my mind and hand. It is mostly pure fantasy, "a pigment of my imagination". The image just popped into my mind. You know they say “creativity is 1% inspiration, and 99% transpiration? It felt like an “elementary particle” – an “ideon” – passed through my brain and left a perceptible trace in the form of an image. That was the inspiration part.  All I knew was that my inner vision said there should be masks of the Venetian type playing chess, and the placement of the masks and the angle of the chessboard. The rest was pure hard work.

What does it mean, what is it about? This people ask me. What can I say, as every one of you will create a story of your own in your mind, it will be symbolic for you in your special way.

I would be delighted if you would like to share your interpretation here in this blog. (You are welcome to write in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, French, German, as well as in English.) Your stories are part of the artwork -- of the dialogue between the artist and the viewers. I want to make this an artproject together with you, and print out the stories and show them with the painting next time I exhibit it. (Please indicate if you want to be anonymous, or want to share your story on the blog only.)

So let's talk, let's have a dialogue!

Äntligen en ny utställning! Du är hjärtligt välkommen till

Vernissage och presentation
 

 ”Sommarens ljus”

Impressionistiska målningar av
Charlotte Herczfeld

Datum: 22 oktober 2011

Tid:   Klockan 13⁰⁰ – 17⁰⁰
Plats: Domkyrkosalen, Katolska domkyrkan Folkungagatan 46, T – Medborgarplatsen
Ca. kl 15⁰⁰ berättar jag om ”Hur man känner igen äkta impressionism”
Utställningen pågår t.o.m. den 6 november, och visas efter överenskommelse, tel. 08 – 747 10 32.

Dear English speaking readers, should you happen to be in Stockholm between October 22 and November 6 (2011), I'd love to see you at my exhibition. The Opening is on October 22, please contact me for further details on where it is.

I have not blogged for months, and the good news is that today all people in my immediate family are hale and well. I have painted, even painted en plein air on the streets and parks of my hometown, Stockholm, Sweden.

There is a whole island which once was a royal hunting ground, called Djurgården. The zoo Skansen and the amusement park Gröna Lund are on this island, and so is the 17th century ship Vasa. It is a very popular recreational area.

Many years ago, one king decided to open the park for visitors, and put up a gate. This gate is still preserved, even though it has been moved several times, the latest to a place very close to where it was once raised. It has been freshened up, and this landmark is called The Blue Gate. Which it is. Vividly. A pure bright cobalt blue, which made a beautiful contrast to the summer foliage of an urban landscape. When nature is solidly green, I prefer to paint in structures that are man-made, to supply variety and interest. And when the structure has grace and beauty of its own, it is perfect.

Look at the larger picture of the impressionist painting The Blue Gate (Blå Porten) on my website.

Sometimes people ask me about an artist who signs his paintings J. Herczfeld. As far as I know, it is not a relative. The name Herczfeld is maybe not very common, but it isn't rare either. The origins of it is the town Bad Hersfeld in Germany. My husband's ancestor moved from there to the Austro-Hungarian empire, ended up in Hungary, where the 's' changed phonetically to 'cz'. Back in those times, 1800s, people often got their last name from the town they were from. (Like the 'Spanish' painter El Greco -- The Greek. Or Leonardo, that guy from the place called Vinci.) There are plenty of Herczfeld, Hersfeld, Hersfeldt, Herczfeldt etc all over the world.

J. might be a John, according to one source. One story I heard is that he was a young man who walked neighbourhoods, knocked on doors, to sell paintings and drawings. Sometimes alone, sometimes together with a young woman. This seems to have happened about two to three generations ago. Possibly in the 30s, or 40s.

I doubt his paintings are worth anything much, so enjoy the beauty of them, and know you have a piece of one man's history in your possession. He got a meal that day the painting changed hands. And could buy a new tube of paint.

Orchid and Chopsticks, the painting which got accepted into the 17th juried show of the IAPS, (the International Association of Pastel Societies, do go and see the fantastic entries and the awarded paintings, it is really a treat for the eyes, these artists are very good), so, yes, this painting is painted from real life, as are all my still-lifes. The human eye sees so very much more than what a camera does, even a good camera. In its turn, the good camera 'sees' and records so much more than what a printer can print, which is why printed photographs are not the best material to work from -- if you want to depict the effects of light. (Photographs work well for other manners of painting, but not for the impressionist tradition.)

This blog-post is for you who are interested in the whole painting process, and for you who are fascinated by this particular way of painting light and colour.

Nothing goes as planned, which this painting proves. I had originally thought to paint orchid blossoms against a light olive-green background, featuring only the flowers. As I was working with the set-up, the idea grew and changed. Light olive became a dark olive (note the old t-shirt serving as a backdrop). I had some laquered Japanese chopsticks I thought of, and then the idea of flirting with elements from the Far East coalesced in my mind. Not a painting trying to imitate styles of other cultures, but a little dalliance with it. Stone gardens, blossoms, bowls, chopsticks. As I was moving the elements around, I decided the composition would be basically circular, or oval to be more precise, so after this photo was taken, I changed some things. The main colour scheme is pinks and greens.



To the left, above, you see a little bit of the setup behind the painting on the easel. As you can see, the photo and the painting (which is not colour corrected for the yellow indoor lightbulb) don't look the same in colour. That is because a camera does not record colour right. The actual painting is much closer to reality than the photo of the items, I have witnesses!

A good tip is to always take a photo of your set-up. I studied variations on the screen of my computer, tried different crops, made changes virtually, which were then made in real life, by moving objects. For example, to get the right curve of the blossoms, which sagged by their own weight, I had to tie them up with a piece of string. Another reason for having a photo of your final setup is that catastrophies can happen. What if you knock it all down, accidentally? It is much easier to re-create it with the help of a recording.

Here's how I paint:

First I do a contour drawing, placing the elements of the composition on the picture plane. The 'action-oval' sits rather high, and the tablecloth dropping down the front serves as an area of little action, a space to rest.

1. (In picture below.) Usually, often, I work on white or a light creamy or sandy tone, in order to let the light reflect better. This time, as the painting was to have many dark areas, I chose to paint on a terracotta coloured piece of Pastelmat. The large masses are blocked in, in the colour of the light, and the colour of the weaker light in the shadows. All light masses get warm colours (direct light is warm), and all the shadow masses get cool colours (the reflected light of my working light is a cool daylight, therefore slightly bluish). These are not local colours (or rarely so), but the colours of light reflected off the surfaces. The background is a dark blue, I hardly ever use black. Stage one is an underpainting, setting the stage for what is to follow.

2. (For you who follow this method, this is the start of stage two, not the finish of it.) Here the relative values are corrected, if needed. In this case, it was needed, as I needed to push the lights lighter (a white or light paper usually does that job, but this paper was darker than the lights). The layers of colour are also built up, to come closer to what I see. But, what about the missing flowers, you ask, didn't you plan for them? Yes I did, but here's a trick: That which is important and which you want to catch attention, that is roughly blocked in at the start, in stage one. That which is to be subdued and hinted at is treated as one mass at the beginning, and added only later as details, in order for it to 'melt into' the background or surroundings. Picture 2, to the right, shows where I stop to evaluate stage 2, and I notice I've painted three equally spaced fold in the cloth, and that is boring, and also detracting, so I paint over the middle stripe of light, as well as deepen the tone of the background, and the drop of the tablecloth.



3. Here is where I start to build volume, making it all three-dimensional looking by adding bands of colour variations. You who know this method will see that I've rushed past stage 3 in the flowers, and nearly finished them. I had to, as the hot halogen light started to change the living flowers too rapidly, for example opening the bud that is the center of interest. I had to respond to the real situation, but as the foundation was solid, all the relationships of the major masses were correct enough, I could do that. Here is where I add bigger details as the flowers that are to be subdued and in shadow.

4. Nearly finished stage four. More colour variations create more 3D. The easiest seen is probably the pinkish reddish band following the left curve of the bawl, which is the reflection of the lit tablecloth. The far right shadow of the chopsticks is added, as it is a small detail, as well as the bright reflection inside the bowl. Here is where the quality of the edges are finalised, too. Some are sharpened, some are blurred. Some edges may need to be more lost, others more found. The final check is for drawing errors that inevitably happen in the process of painting.

See a larger version of the finished painting in the Works section of this site.

"A few benches under a chestnut tree, the ivy hanging from the surrounding façades makes the space a lush, relaxed spot. During summers, a network of storytellers gather around the benches to tell their stories both to enthusiasts and passers-by.A building (...) destroyed by fire in 1728, was apparently not rebuilt for a few decades, which gave first the lot and then the open space their names. The turning radius of horse-drawn vehicles made open spaces necessary..."

• tripod
• plywood (shelf)
• foldable display easel
• scrap of wood
• sawn off bits from easel
• screws
• glue
• and a 'hole', the kind of nut that is inserted at bottoms of cameras, for attaching the holder to the head of the tripod.