The Painter in Oil A complete treatise on the principles and technique necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors

Of all your materials, it is on your paints that quality has the most vital effect. With bad paint your work is hopeless. You may get an effect that looks all right, but how lon...

From the usual rating of figures as the most important branch of painting, it would be natural to speak of that kind of work first. But work from the head must come before you a...

The subject of color naturally divides, for the painter, into two branches,--color as a _quality_, and color as _material_. Considered in the former class, it divides into an ab...

The broadest classification of figure pictures is to consider them as of two kinds,--those painted in an out-door or diffused light, and those painted in an in-door or concentra...

All painters have difficulty with their pictures, but the trouble with the beginner is that he has not experience enough to know how to meet it. The solving of all difficulties...

The name of still life is used in English for all sorts of pictures which represent groupings of inanimate objects except flowers. The French word for it is better than ours. Th...

Don't look upon portraits as something any one can do. A portrait is more than a likeness, and the painting of it gives scope for all of the great qualities possible in art. Onl...

=Importance.=--Composition is of the utmost importance. It is impossible that a picture should be good without it. You may define it as that study by means of which the balance...

Some pictures, particularly those begun and finished in the open air, may be frankly commenced immediately on the canvas from nature as she is before the painter, and without an...

Although much has been said about the theoretical and abstract side of painting, and the importance of the æsthetic elements in art have been insisted upon, it is not to be supp...

=Premier Coup.=--Something similar to what I have spoken of as "direct painting" has long been a much-advocated manner of painting in France, under the name of _Premier Coup_; w...

An old brush that has been properly cared for is generally better than a new one. It seems to have accommodated itself to your way of painting, and falls in with your peculiarit...

Drawing is basic to painting. Good painting cannot exist without it. I do not mean that there must be always the outline felt or seen, but that the understanding of relative pos...

There is a theoretical and a practical side to art. The business of the student is with the practical. Theories are not a part of his work. Before any theoretical work is done t...

There is a right and a wrong way to study, and it all centres around the fact that what you aim to learn is perception and expression. What you are to express you do not learn;...

You should have plenty of canvas on hand, and it would be well if you had it all stretched ready for use. Many a good day's work is lost because of the time wasted in getting a...

All that has been said on landscape painting applies to marines. You have the same open-air feeling and vibration of light and color. There is no need to say the same things ove...

The sketch is the germ of the picture. It contains the idea which may later become the finished work. In your sketches you gather effects and suggestions of possibilities, of al...

=Chiaroscuro.=--A few words about chiaroscuro will be useful. This is a term of great importance and frequent use with artists and writers up to within the last thirty or forty...

=The Term.=--The word "values" is seldom understood by the average individual, yet it should not be difficult to take in. It means simply the relation between degrees of strengt...

A picture is made up of many elements. Certain of them are essentially abstract. They must be thought out by a sort of _mental vision without words_. This is the most subtle and...

Copying may well be spoken of here, as it is in a sense a kind of manipulation. It is a means of study to the student, and a useful, sometimes necessary process to the painter....

A painting-room is always a matter of serious consideration, and to the beginner one of difficulty. The arrangement of light is not easy, and a special window is almost always o...

Flower painting is the refinement of still life. You have the same control of combination, but you have not the same control of time. Flowers will change, and change more rapidl...

It remains to speak of those tools which are not essentials, but conveniences, to painting. Even as conveniences, however, they are of importance enough to have an influence on...

The qualities which make a good study are the reverse of those which make a good sketch. In the sketch all is sacrificed to the effect, or to the one thing which is its purpose....

There are two kinds of perspective, linear and aërial. The former has to do with the manner in which horizontal lines appear to converge as they recede from the foreground, and...

Originality is not a thing to strive for. If it comes, it is not through striving. The search for originality seldom results in anything worth having. It is a quality inherent i...

A vehicle is any liquid which is mixed with the color to make it fluent. The vehicle may be ground with the pigment or mixed with it on the palette, or both. Oil colors are of c...

The important thing in an easel is that it should be steady and firm; that it should hold the canvas without trembling, and so that it will not fall as you paint out towards the...

The most important qualities in a palette are that it should be large enough, and that it should balance well on the thumb. Whether it is round or square is a slight matter. The...

It is a mistake to make pictures too soon. The nearest a student is likely to get to a picture is a careful study, and he will be as successful with this, if he makes it for the...

Why not recognize that conviction, intense personal attraction to a certain sort of thing is the life of all art. How else can life get into art than through the love of what yo...

=Reasons.=--Painting is something more than laying on paint. It implies a certain amount of knowledge of necessary preliminaries--technical matters which are not strictly painti...

There is a false implication in the saying that "a poor workman blames his tools." It is not true that a good workman can do good work with bad tools. On the contrary, the good...

XXII. Representation 209 XXIII. Manipulation 224 XXIV. Copying 236 XXV. Kinds of Painting 242 XXVI. The Sketch 245 XXVII. The Study 254 XXVIII. Still Life 260 XXIX. Flowers 280...

CHAPTER PAGE I. Observations 3 II. Canvases and Panels 6 III. Easels 15 IV. Brushes 20 V. Paints 33 VI. Vehicles and Varnishes 61 VII. Palettes 65 VIII. Other Tools 69 IX. Studi...