Victoria Lowenstein

[Jeanine Jackson]

Dear Chris:
It's good to be back! Roland and I have established residence in Cape Coral, Florida, moved to a new summer home in SIlvermine, CT, and finally took that sailing trip along Long Island Sound. I basically abandonned ship last weekend to study with the great, and yes, very funny Richard Whitney. I wanted to share this wonderful experience with SOG.
Thank you for the warm welcome back to this wonderful forum!


Dear Alexandra:
Thank you for your kind words.
We had two cadmiums (orange and red light) along with Alizarin, Indian Red, Flake White, Yellow Ochre, Raw Umber, Viridian, Cerulean, Ultramarine, and Ivory Black.
My natural instinct was to use a few of these to mix out four value piles of her primary skin tone. The challenge Richard put to me straight away was to stop that ! He had me mix as needed directly on my brush for that impressionist touch of color next to color.
Talk about tough! I think another ten years of practice should suffice to learn how to hit correct value, chroma, and hue correctly on a single brush. Igor Babailov also teaches a similar approach. Admittedly, both of these artists demonstrate a freshness in skin tones that are to be admired.
My goal has always been to capture that art of casual mastery my mentor, the late George Passantino called "Sprezzatura" while respecting the form and other rules of classical realism.
Unlike Whitney, Passantino did not like surprise colors on his brush and trained us to pre-mix our skin tones for consistancy and control. Mattleson starts with a similar palette and mixes as he goes from each value group. Both of these artists developed their controlled palettes with 10 values from the Riley method. Passantino, in fact, took over Riley's class at the Art Students' League and became one of the most beloved painters for Portraits Inc. and Portraits North.
Then there are the Daniel Greene and Michael Del Priore approaches to color that have us premix three values of myriad skin tones that get picked up as needed. This is a clear advantage for alla prima painting.
I found Whitney's class inspiring on many levels and look forward to keeping his precious lessons with me as my painting journey continues. Some will be easier than others to assimilate.
His early emphasis on the contour and design of the painting, for example, was reinforced by images by Russian Masters and was an immediate help to my "way of seeing." The distinctions he made between flat, transparent, and broad treatment of shadow areas versus the detailed, thick, "Bunkered (sp?)" effects in the light and highlights will remain with me forever.
All of us fortunate enough to study with various masters face the challenge of keeping what we must to achieve our artistic goals. Thank you for taking time to read all of these jabberings. Writing this has help clarify the work ahead of me!