figure drawings from France

[Patton Art]

Hello!
I went out to France to study at a small newer atelier. It was started by Tim Stotz, Michelle Tully, and Anthony Ryder... all 3 of them having studied under Ted Seth Jacobs. Tim and Michelle were also some of the original students of the Water Street atelier, but their work is more influenced by Ted (they studied under him longer).
Anyways, I was only there for 3 months... that's all I can afford. But I think I learned a lot. We didn't try to make finished pretty pictures, more like just practice beginning them. Lots and lots of blocking in, lots of focus on gesture and action. anyways, here's some of my more finished stuff from there.
http://www.geocities.com/nubefatal/harmonystretch.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/nubefatal/harmony_towerofbabel_sinia.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/nubefatal/harmony.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/nubefatal/harmony2.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/nubefatal/fullbodysp.jpg

If anyone wants to check out the school, it's Studio Escalier. www.studioescalier.com
Tim is a freakin AWESOME teacher, really cool guy. He's moreso the drawing teacher.... He's a real intellectual, he knows how to put his ideas into words. Michelle is moreso the painting teacher. She's also amazing. And I'm sure everyone knows who Tony Ryder is, after his book and all.

There's a residency program coming up next year for 5 months, you go for a month at a time. There's gonna be awesome teachers there, Tony, Ted Seth Jacobs, Mike Grimaldi, and a bunch of other artists... or theres the 3 month program with Tim and Michelle. But ey, it's 6 hours of life drawing a day, Monday through Friday. 6 hours with a model every day, with people who know what theyre talkin about critiquing you throughout the day!

haha anyways, sorry if i sound like an advertisement. I just liked the school a lot...... it's new and everything, I just want to see it succeed and stay around.

lemme know what you think;

--Keith

[Matt Smith]

These look pretty nice. I looked at the site and the school sounds interesting. I am curious how much does it cost in US dollars, i saw some prices in euros for apartments.

[Patton Art]

it cost me around 3000 US dollars for 3 months...
I know I could go somewhere like Mims Studios or somewhere in the US for around 1500 for 3 months. But there they only do figure drawing in the morning, then cast drawing/still life/etc in the afternoons. This focuses on figure drawing the entire day.... plus the instructor is there all day, not just a weekly critique.

The thing that sucks is the USD to Euro exchange rate. The USD isn't doin too well, which is driving the price up. :-\

[down]

BRAVOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!

That's all I can say. I like these man.

Shit! I have to go Home (Spain) and visit FRANCE... but now that seems to be faaaaaar awaaaaaaay...

[Crunch]

great...no amazing stuff man. those three months had to be freaking imspiring as anything. id like to see more work though. really really good stuff man....i liked what you said about starting a drawing, starting a drawing correctly is essential....if you dont know how to start a drawing correctly then how can you plan to finish it and make it good? love to see more.

[ReAkshun]

stuff looks good. I really like the third one. That one was one its way to being "the shit." How many hours did you spend on that one?

I've heard of that guy, Ted Seth Jacobs. He either wrote this book called, "Light for The Artist" (something like that) or he's this bad ass alla prima dude. Either way...he's dope.

So, now that your done with that academic training...what are you doing with it?

[Patton Art]

hey there
thanks for all the comments and shtuff!\

Spain? that's awesome! i heard that Barcelona is amazing... me and a friend might be goin out there after he graduates and just paint for a summer. we'll see, we talkeda bout it, not too seriously though.

crunch: i dont have all that much more on my comp... i didnt bring home any gesture sketches at all, and all the rest are just block-ins.... maybe i'll show some block-ins here... who knows.

haha... i'm nowhere near done with my academic training. that was 3 months... you're not academically trained for, like, 3 years.
ok, ted seth jacobs.... he's really good. i'm about to put him on a pedestal, but he's like the big guy around where i studied, so I'm gonna brag about him a little:
He did both... he wrote Light for the Artist and he's also an awesome alla prima painter. you'd think he works in multiple layers like a bunch of other realists, but he actually just goes in and does it.
he started studying at the Art Students League at 12, then went full time around 15 or 16 I think. At 18 he was teaching there. He was there around the time of the big Golden Age of Illustration... so he was associated with Bridgeman, Rockwell, Dumond, Cornwell, that school. At around 18ish one of his drawings was put in a show in a musuem and was said to be an original P'rudhon. Not sure if everyone knows their art history, but, that's pretty impressive for a dude in his late teens to get mistaken for Prudhon.
Later on he did a bunch of stuff, taught more, wrote 2 books (Light for the Artist being one of them, which I got hand signed now!)... him and Andy Warhol opened up the New York Academy of Figurative Art. Warhol didnt like not getting academic training, he was actually a big supporter of it, and Ted was the main guy at the League at the time (there werent any other ateliers in america at the time, ASL was 'it' for academic training), so I think that's why they founded the Academy.
anyways, about him painting alla prima. people usually think of alla prima as a quick sketch done in oils... alla prima is really just painting in one pass, whether it takes 10 minutes or a year. he starts out with a really good drawing, then does a color wash... it's a thin layer,full pallette, thinned down with turp. that's to basically get rid of the white of the canvas. after it's dry he goes in and just paints, fully finishing section by section.

sorry, sounds like i'm worshipping him here... just tryin to say that i recommend studying with anyone from his school and shtuff.


but anyways, when i'm done with my training... i'd like to do some illustration... but i think getting involved in the print industry would be smart. i mean fine art prints... if you get in with a big publisher, there's a lot of money there. if there's 800 prints of something being sold at 100 each (the bigger artists go for like 600 for a print, but i'm bein more realistic)... that's 80,000 dollars... then the artist gets so much of that. and theres a lot more than 800 prints around the USA if youre with a bigger publisher. i'm into genre painting, so, i think that might be something i want to get into.

anyways, sorry for the long message!