In the previous post we painted a physical and psychological portrait of a female figure. When we paint a landscape or still life we do the same thing; capture a likeness and the character of the trees or fields, or mountains or clouds, or apples or flowers before us. We also want to paint a portrait of the light that illuminates our subject. The figure shown here is a classroom critique that I gave in studio 7 at the Art Students League. Studio 7 has a marvelous skylight so our figure is lit by natural light. Now imagine that you are in the night class in the same studio. You are painting in the same spot, with the same model in the same pose, but with artificial light. The only difference is the character of the light falling on your figure, yet you will have a very different painting. Any plein air landscape painter can tell how frustrating it is when you are doing a sunny painting and the sun moves in and out of the clouds. Each time the sun appears or disappears your painting changes. The light has changed, it has a different character. Now we've become aware that what attracted us to the subject of our painting was not only the scene or the object but also the way it was lit and the quality of that light. So we must paint an expressive portrait of the light. We are now painting two portraits, one of the subject and one of the light, but there is yet one more portrait to consider for our masterpiece.....

When I teach I like to work directly on the student's painting. If I tell them the figure in their painting needs more light or weight, or the drawing is off, they usually understand what I mean. However if I show them how to mix the paint and apply it to the canvas the lesson is seen as well as heard. When they see their painting change the lesson has more resonance. The image posted here is one such classroom critique. Everyone who walks into the classroom wants to learn how to paint what they see. One of my first lessons is to help them understand what they see. "To paint what you see" I tell them "you must paint three portraits at the same time." The first, obviously, is a physical and psychological portrait of the subject before you, in this case a magnificent nude figure. Everyone sees the size and shape of the figure, her proportions and features, the colors and harmonies of what is before them. We don't see weight or character or attitude but we know that is something we want to get into our painting too. But there are two other portraits we must paint in order to paint what we see, a portrait of the light falling on the nude and a portrait of the space she is sitting in.....