A New Start! "The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son Jean"

This is the painting I am copying now: "The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son Jean"

I went in with a clean, white, freshly stretched canvas. Quite large - the original painting measures 45 3/4" x 34 15/16". We are restricted to no larger than 40" in our copies, so I started plugging in numbers to the "painting resizer" Excel spreadsheet that my husband, Hal, made for me to ensure that my reduced-size copy is as close as possible to the proportions of the original, to the nearest whole inch (commercial stretcher bars only come in whole inches, and although I stretch my own canvases, I'm not fanatical enough to make my own stretchers!) 

Using the spreadsheet, I came up with a size of 38" x 29", which the local art supply store, Plaza, happily had in stock. So over the weekend I stretched the canvas, and finished the three coats of gesso and one coat of polymer matte medium (to seal the gesso) late last night. 

Since I finished it so late, I didn't have time to mark the centers of the sides of the canvas, and had to measure it by eye in the museum. I certainly make things hard for myself! But it was a great learning experience - by carefully analyzing the painting, I saw that the vertical center line goes right down the edge of the strong vertical shadow in the cradle's drapery, and passes through the baby's face. The horizontal center goes from Camille's shoulder, through her chin, and across to the top edge of the dark brown horizontal shape on the left. I further subdivided the grid on my canvas into quarters (just the lower half) and further into eighths. Then I carefully drew in (with thin gray paint) all the major shapes of the painting. I also had an "aha" moment - up until today, I didn't really understand the space in the painting - I thought it was a kind of ambiguous space, with the diagonal of drapery and yellow and dark brown area on the left not making much sense to me. Then suddenly I realized that it is a bed on the left, with a yellow blanket, and a wooden footboard, and curtains coming in from the upper left corner that hang around the bed. The back wall in the painting must be draperies over windows, and the cradle has its own curtain that can be drawn around it when the baby is sleeping.

Here is the drawing after two solid hours of measuring, painting, rubbing out, and redrawing:

After lunch, I continued correcting the drawing, and finally started painting colors in. This is the fun part! I was glad I had spent so much time working on the drawing because now I can concentrate on channeling Monet's mark-making.

Here is a shocking confession: back when I was in middle school, other kids used to get me to forge their parent's names on absentee passes after they skipped school! Copying this painting strongly reminded me of that - using carefully pre-mixed colors, I just zoned out and tried to make the marks that he did (his "handwriting"). This is just a start - next week, I will mix a lot more paint, and try to cover much more ground.

Day 4 and Done, "Bazille and Camille"

Things fell into place today, and I was able to wrap up this copy. All I had to do was tiny tweaks in Bazille's face, put in more of the foreground plants, and add more bright green leaves to the background forest. Also darken the blue sky slightly and add the sun dapples on the ground. They are not quite the correct color, and the brushstrokes are not Exactly like his, but I was going for the spirit of the painting rather than the letter, so to speak.

(click on the images for a larger view)

Now, on to the next one! I already requested, and got permission, to copy another early Monet:

I've been eyeing this painting for years. I think it will be pretty challenging - all those close shades of whites and neutrals, with bright primary colors surrounding the baby's face in the center of the painting. I love how the baby looks, like he's either about to cry or fall asleep. He doesn't look too happy, but like he's too tired to put up much of a fuss.

This weekend I'll stretch the canvas, which in accordance with National Gallery rules will be at least 2" smaller (or larger, but I always do smaller) than the original. I also try very hard to keep the same proportions. Next Tuesday I will bring the new canvas in and jump right in on this one. Stay tuned!

Bazille and Camille, Day 3

I returned to the National Gallery after two weeks off. It was a beautiful day - I had to pull out my camera and take this picture of the Calder sculpture with a very unusual tree shadow outside the museum's 7th Street entrance:

Then it was time to get to work on my copy. The first order of business was to make Camille a little shorter. It was not as hard to do as you would think - I just painted the background down over her shoulders a little, and lowered her bun and ear and hair, and then brought the background color down over her hat - voila, she got shorter! Just a little, but it made me feel better.

Here is the progress I made today: I put in a good deal of the light green grass and leaves, and I repainted all of Bazille: his hat, face, clothes, hand, and walking-stick. I had thought that I might finish today, but I decided not to rush it. There's not too much left to do, so next Tuesday should be my last day on this one.