ART OF GEORGE WILLIAM VAN HUMBECK

As my children were a great source for art in their younger years, so too is my granddaughter; every artist should get one. One day I found Tarja reading Cat in the Hat in the family room. It was not an ideal setting, so I grabbed my camera and asked her to bring her book outside. I tried to give her as much freedom as possible in the hopes of creating natural poses, except directing her to first sit and read and then lie down and read. All in the lawn.

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Now I don't know if I'm just not that good of a photographer, but I've noticed that rarely are my painting sourced from just one photograph. I'd like to think I'm picky. When it comes to composing, explore all possibilities. Don't settle for what you decide is the best of the photos you shot. There is a difference in the artistic disciplines of photography and painting even if your work is realism. For Cat in the Hat, Tarja's head and body came from separate photos and another for the background.

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Before working on this painting I read an artist's suggestion: "Throw away all those greens." I must say I did have a lot of different greens. I have always believed in the importance of limiting your pallet. A limited pallet makes it easy to unify your painting. As your subject should looked bathed in the same air and light throughout the setting, limiting your pallet will aid in this. I decided to take the challenge and not use any of my green tubes. For the entire painting my pallet consisted of cobalt blue, cadmium yellow medium, cadmium red medium, titanium white, and ivory black. The variations of green that can be mixed satisfied my needs. Please understand that I am not telling you not to buy green paint. In Ralph Mayer's The Artist's Handbook of Materials and Techniques, the spectrum analysis shows that there are some greens that just can't be made by mixing any blues and yellows. You will need to decide what works for you and your current project.