Finishing Damselflies, Returning to Warblers

I've finally finished the Stream Bluets acrylic painting, having let it sit for between 4 and 8 weeks. For me one of my great artistic fears is overworking a painting to the point that it seems lifeless. Sometimes it  can take years to sense the lifelessness, possibly because after all the work of the overworking I, and probably many others, hate to admit that it didn't work. So when I started up acrylic painting again early this spring I often left paintings temporarily finished in very early states. I didn't want to overwork them.

Finally I decided that I was willing to take the chance of overworking on this painting. It's always hard to say when a work of art is done, particularly ones done in such fluid media as oil or acrylic. It's just so easy to make a few more changes. Of course it's never quite that simple. One change leads to another, etc., etc. But in this  case I think I've frozen the fluidity at the best place.

To me it still looks like a painting, one concerned with shape, color, composition, etc. But it also looks like a plausible representation of a real event, damselflies in a frenzy over a stream, with many of them mating and  ovipositing. To me it is more realistic than many illustrations  that show much more detail. It's a very old debate between painting and illustration. But for me I think it's fairly simple. Illustration always values some sort of representational  detail over something both truer to experience and more satisfying artistically, not that there isn't artistically satisfying illustration. I'm going to leave it at that since I've written about this before. The last thing I'd say is that when most people actually see such a scene in front of them I think that they experience it more the way my painting portrays it than the way most illustrations do.

Stream Bluets at Papermill Run. Acrylic Painting. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

Due to Covid and lockdowns we missed much of spring migration. But now that fall migration has begin and now that I've figured out where I can bird with a fair amount of safety and few crowds I've been doing a fair amount of birding. Fortunately that has resulted in my seeing many migrants including the colorful warblers, even if some of them are not as colorful as in spring.

As usual it is often quite hard to even SEE them long enough and well enough to identify them, let alone photograph them and in particular sketch  them. I think that probably the only way to successfully sketch migrating warblers from life is to find an area where you think that they might remain for more than a few minutes and then concentrate on just one or  two species. If you continually are trying to identify each little flurry of movement you see you'll never get any sketching done.

But for me, especially having missed most of spring migration, it's hard to make that sacrifice. And so I've tried to both identify and photograph them but not sketch them. BUT I don't at all like trying to make art from the photographs I've made of them. I've written about  this for years and so I hope  I won't  rehash too much of what I've already written.

But I think it is similar to what I just wrote about illustration and damselflies. There is a real danger  of  too much  information. When you know a great deal about insects, birds or whatever you may feel a great need to show all of this knowledge in each piece of  art that you make. Perhaps you feel that someone might say, oh he doesn't understand that bird because  he left out the dark at the base of the primaries. Many years ago there was an article on the front page of the Wall Street Journal about such art and its audience. Unfortunately it was in praise of it!!!

Art is a lively, fluid medium that I don't believe should be beholden to reality, not that anyone agrees on just what reality is. But art is one thing, science is  another, knowledge is another, etc., etc. To me it is a bit like the male athletes I used to see at the outdoor swimming pool when I was a student at Berkeley. Smaller females would fly by the young male athletes in the swimming lanes, seemingly without effort. The males were all effort, all that strength, but strength directed in the wrong direction, down rather than forward. It was a sight to  see. But it's also I think an example of  being not using your abilities in the best manner. The males had strength but they used it wrongly. They would have been better off, at least in the pool, forgetting all about it, or at least directing it forward. The  same thing happens I think with knowledge in art. It can weigh you down just as much as the strength of  those male floppers, I  mean swimmers.

So with all that in mind I wanted to somehow use the warblers I've seen recently as the subject of prints and/or paintings. But  I just didn't want to deal with the excess information of a photo. That's when I decided that if I just looked through the small viewfinder  of my camera at the photos I took the view would be small enough that I'd have to ignore details and just stick to the basics. So  that's what the next four photos are. After I'd sketched them in pencil I added a small bit  of watercolor. I particularly chose photos that had the birds in what to me were fairly active positions, i.e. not just sitting there as though posing.

Pencil and watercolor sketch of Blackburnian Warbler. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

Pencil and watercolor sketch of Black-throated Green Warbler. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

Pencil and watercolor sketch of Tennessee Warbler. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

 

Pencil and watercolor sketch of Chestnut-sided Warbler. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

After I'd done those sketches I started making compositional studies where I combined one, two or more of the warblers. At one point I decided I needed a larger warbler in the foreground. For some reason I decided to add a Canada Warbler. But since I haven't seen one recently I used a photo that is more than 10 years old, and one that also served as an early unsuccessful watercolor. After I'd done a few pencil and collage studies I added watercolor  to one.

Pencil compositional study for warblers. Copyright 2020  Ken Januski

Pencil and watercolor compositional study for warblers. Copyright 2020  Ken Januski

I will probably use the color study as the basis of a painting or print. But in the meantime I've continued to bird and so see birds. Yesterday I saw both male and female Black-throated Blue Warblers. After I'd been home for awhile I decided that I'd like to do a small study of the female. This is something I used to do with much more frequency. It's both a celebration of the bird and an educational exercise, trying to get me to look closer and imprint on my memory some of the details of the bird. I'm not sure if the educational goal ever gets achieved. I'm sure I forget much of what I think I'm learning as I make the sketch. Still there is always something rewarding in doing them, assuming that I can stand to look at them once I've done(i.e., they don't always work  out).

Ballpoint pen and watercolor study of  female Black-throated Blue Warbler. Copyright 2020 Ken Januski

(Well the new Blogger continues to create more expletives than blogs. But at this point I can't worry about it and I'm sure my readers don't care either. But I have to say it reminds me of Facebook and its recent changes, made by people who seem to have never used the product.)

More Warblers, and Birds In Art 2014

Chestnut-sided Warbler and Veery. Field Sketches and Watercolor Sketches by Ken Januski.

There has been a flurry of migrant activity in the last few days, much of it centered around the berries of Devil's Walkingstick. On Wednesday thrushes, mainly Veeries and American Robins, but also one Wood Thrush dominated the early part of mywalk, while warblers and vireos dominated the last part.

Today I started an hour later than usual and found fewer thrushes. But the warblers and vireos were still manically feeding,  some on Devil's Walkingstick but others elsewhere, including a Red-eyed Vireo in the huge and bright red fruit of the Umbrella Magnolia. If  you're alert and doing more than just checking species off a list, now is the time when you can find a lot of interest in what the migrant birds are eating. Spicebush fruit are also popular, as are of course all of the insects on them and other plants.

As I said in last post I really do have enough photos of most species. So I tried to concentrate on looking and sketching today. It was hard as both warblers and vireos were hyperactive. Finally I'd seen enough Chestnut-sided Warblers that I thought I could risk a field sketch from memory as seen at the top of photo above. It was alright but seemed off in ways. So after getting home I looked very briefly at one of my field guides then did the very small watercolor sketch on the bottom of page above.

It's very small but I'm happy with it, though I did mistakenly paint olive green where the white throat should be. I know artists who often do slightly more developed works as soon as they can after getting back from sketching birds in the field. It seems like a good idea, especially if you can use the field sketches as the basis of it and not rely much on photos and guides. I think that help keeps it simple, unified and fresh.  (A day latter and I saw a Veery while out walking. I added a field sketch of it above and then a quick watercolor based on it when I got home, as seen on right hand page above).

Speaking of simple, unified and fresh I received the catalog from Birds in Art today, a show I've been rejected from for about 10 years now. I'm not even sure why I apply any more. And I always have to steel myself to open up the catalog and look at it. I know my reaction will be immediate dislike at the timidity and formulaic quality of much of the work, and stronger dislike at the photographic origins of even more.

I wasn't quite as apprehensive today because I knew that the featured artist, and Master Artist for 2014, is Barry Van Dusen. His  work is simple, unified and fresh, in the best sense of all of those words. And I wasn't disappointed. Such refreshing work and a refreshing essay on his work by artist Darren Rees. I wouldn't be surprised even if a little bit of influence of those watercolors didn't make it into the tiny sketch of the Chestnut-sided Warbler above.

I go nuts when I look at BIA catalogs, wishing that just once I'd find a happy surprise in one of them. I almost never do. There were one or two today, though none that just knocked me over as happened the first time I saw work from The Society of Wildlife Artists. But the work and the essay on the work of Barry Van Dusen certainly brightened my day.

As I've written before I'll continue to look at the catalog and eventually find in looking at the work and in reading what artists have written about their work that I can appreciate far more than I can at first, second and third glance. But I do wish that one day I'd open it up and be knocked off my feet.  I'm definitely not holding my breath.

After I'd finished this I realized that I can sound extremely negative about bird art and Birds in Art. So I thought it made sense to add a bit more about this catalog. There is much competent art in it. That itself is an accomplishment. And I suppose that's why, over time, I find that I can find much to appreciate in each catalog, even if I don't really like it.

But I do like some work and I decided to name artists who struck me right off the bat:

John Busby
James Coe
Peter Elfman
Anne Senechal Faust
Andrew Haslen
Lars Jonssson
Johannes Nevala
Andrea Rich

I should add that I was already fond of all of the above artists with the exception of Johannes Nevala. I was newly struck by him. If I wasn't already familiar with the others I'm sure at least some of them would have knocked me over. The Andrea Rich woodcut was the opposite in that it grows on me each time I look at it. Some of this is very rich work.

There were some others who are not as much to my taste perhaps but whose qualities I can't and wouldn't want to deny. They are striking in their own way:

William Althier
Robert Bateman
Jim Bortz
Kathleen Dunphy
Cindy House
James Morgan
Sean Murtha
Peter Nilsson
Thomas Quinn
Maynard Reece(pretty bold for 94!)
Chirag V. Thumbar
Sherrie York

I haven't mentioned sculpture mainly because I'm not as familiar with it. In general though I find that  I like it more than much of the two dimensional art. I'm not sure why that is but I wouldn't be surprised if it's because it seems more direct and less mediated by the numbness of photography. Certainly there is far more abstraction in the sculpture than in the two dimensional work and this seems true year after year.

In naming names like this I know that anyone who reads this and happens to be in the show might be disappointed especially if I don't mention them, though most will have no idea who I am, nor care. As I said most of the work is competent. And in a week I'm sure I could add many more artists to the second group. Perhaps even in 15 minutes after posting this.

Perhaps this year's show is better than average.  I do find that I seem to like more and am pulling my hair out about less. But I do wish I'd find more exciting work. Perhaps that is asking too much, particularly given the stranglehold that photography has had on American wildlife art for so long.

A Day Without Warblers

Bay-breasted Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Black and White Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.



Black-throated Green Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Black-throated Green Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski

Baltimore Oriole et al. Field Sketch by Ken Januski

After all the warblers of Magee Marsh, seen with very little obfuscating foliage, it's been quite a change to return to my local Philadelphia haunts and find that the few warblers that are here are often extremely high and/or hidden by extensive foliage. Each day out reminds me of the saying about a day without wine being like a day without sunshine. Or perhaps a day without jazz is like a day without sunshine as a public radio station in Kentucky used to say. I feel like I'm going through warbler withdrawal.

But there have been some warblers and also other first of season or first of year birds for Philadelphia. It's been a treat to see familiar thrushes, flycatchers and orioles again. Many of them will remain here and nest. The field sketch immediately above shows some of the local birds, a not quite local Chestnut-sided Warbler seen from more or less straight underneath, a House Finch at feeder, a mystery flycatcher that turned out to be an Acadian, and a Baltimore Oriole.

Each year I promise myself to be a bit more discriminating in the art I show on this blog and elsewhere. My intent it so show more finished work and less working sketches, often of not the best quality. But guess what? It's easier said than done, this producing finished quality work idea.

I've struggled for the last week with small watercolor sketches in my Stillman and Birn 5.5x8.5 Gamma sketchbook. These are all based on photos from Magee, the things I took after I'd done some field sketches. The sketchbooks themselves are fine.

But most of the sketches leave something if not a lot to be desired, especially when you consider the beauty of the birds when seen live.  And of course there is size. I had one Black-throated Green land within a hand's reach of me. At that close range you see how delicate and really tiny they are. All the more reason to pursue my ongoing goal of doing them justice in paint. I've seen thousands of illustrations of warblers. I've seen exceedingly few successful paintings of them.

I recently read a post elsewhere about watercolor not actually being hard. But it is. It is exceedingly hard. It's only easy if you really don't understand how great watercolor can be, for instance in the work of Winslow Homer or John Singer Sargent, both of whose work is full of light and life. If you only use watercolor to fill in areas with color that is something else again. It still requires skill I think. But it completely ignores the sense of transparency and light which in my humble opinion is the only reason to even use watercolor.

More Flycatchers

A little over a month ago I saw an Olive-sided Flycatcher at Morris Arboretum. Though I'm well aware of what they look like I took a photo of it because of the color of the underside of its tail, not because I recognized it as an Olive-sided. I didn't I think because it wasn't in the right context. I just don't expect to find them here, even though I've been reading about them migrating through Pennsylvania for the last month.

Yesterday Jerene and I decided to take  advantage of the beautiful weather and visit Morris in the afternoon. Almost as soon as we arrived a large flycatcher landed near us in a large dead tree, a popular spot for many birds at Morris. Sure enough it was another Olive-sided. Above is a quick watercolor done this morning from one of the photos I  took as well as two field sketches done from life. In the second you  can see I've portrayed the white tuft that occasionally is visible behind the tertials on this bird. It's also visible in one of  the photos below.

Because this seems to be an unusual bird in Philadelphia I've included the two photos above for ebird reviewers or anyone else who wants more 'proof' than my own say so. In a way I hate to encourage the reliance on photos since they're so often unreliable. But when they're clearcut I guess that they do no harm. Still I do try to avoid them. There are a few trillion blogs with photos. I think some people hunger for something different.

In the page of field sketches above are a female Black-throated Blue warbler, a Chestnut-sided Warbler, an Eastern Phoebe, tiny Northern Parula seem from beneath and another flycatcher that sketching helped me to ID as an Eastern Pewee. I'm still struck by how much sketching is a from of learning, not so much about the skill of drawing as it is about seeing better. It's long been a British tradition with birders. It's too bad it's not so here.