My second artist that I am interested in the work of is a Scottish artist Scott Naismith (Born in South Lanarkshire) who is a contemporary artist, who studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee in 1996, and graduated with and honour in illustrating as well as mark making.
Ever since then Naismith has been a full time artist, with the majority of his paintings being based on various Scottish landscaped such as the sea, isles or mountains, that he embraces with the main focus point being how light is presented through colours and vigorous application of layering media and using vibrant oil paint colours to create an emotional and energetic response for the viewers to experience
Here are some examples of his artwork bellow;
Above Scott Naismith ‘Diminuendo Shore’ Contemporary Scottish abstract landscape painting, acrylic and oil on canvas, 40cm x 40cm (1)
Above Scott Naismith 'CMY Floral Study' oil on canvas, 30x30 (2).
One of his paintings that I have chosen to analyse in particular is ‘Sisters of Glencoe’ which is a Atmospheric Highlands mountain (In the west coast of Scotland) painting inspired by the 3 sisters of Glencoe.
(Above ‘Sisters of Glencoe’, oil on canvas, 80 x 120cm (3)
For this painting the artist wanted to capture the atmosphere and lights that the mountains created. What I like about this painting is although in real life the mountains are a more earthy colour, Naismith takes them to a different level away from reality to embrace and slightly exaggerate his own style and thoughts and shows the towering effect of the mountains.
Before painting the actual painting Naismith took photographs of the mountains, and sketched out a rough idea of his painting using an Ipad, to briefly plan out.
When painting this painting Naismith was inspired by a French artist named Henri Matisse, especially his use of colour and composition. Here is an example of Henri Matisse artwork bellow. Which inspired the spaced out block marks of Naismith’s painting and balanced out colours.
(Above, Henri Matisse – The Snail, gouache on paper, cut and pasted on paper mounted on canvas, year 1953, 2864 x 2870 mm (4)
To analyse this painting it was helpful that Naismith had previously uploaded a video of how he paints this painting along with various other paintings. This in particular was helpful as I now understand the process and techniques required to create a painting as such.
I chose this painting in particular is because of the lively and bright colours that the artist has used that really grab my attention, also it is interesting how the artist layers various colours over and over each other over several goes.
As seen in the part 1 video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5AbdwmcgIY ) Naismith began by applying yellow oil paint on a blank canvas which he painted free hand all over the canvas with no particular lines or shapes using a larger paintbrush. He then continued doing the same but with an orange toned oil paint which he then blended lightly with the edges of the yellow paint, I believe by doing this the artist created a sunny and light effect to make the sky that will later be painted stand out more, it also adds depth and tone as a beginning layer.
Although in the beginning Naismith does not paint any particular details or lines, he still maps out his painting by firstly closely observing his photograph and then briefly applying colours to the canvas to know where to add what shades.
(A print screen image of Scott Naismith’s video from youtube (5)
As seen in the image above, Naismith carefully applied the colours which at the beginning may appear intense and bright, unlike the more composed but still bright colours in the completed painting. It is through blending and layering that Naismith achieved those nice tones from the oil paint. Naismith then applied texture and more layers of paint over the under layer by using a spatula and a smaller paintbrush, instead of applying smooth layers of paint he intentionally left thicker patches of paint this way creating more dimension and a rougher feel.
After completing the first layer Naismith began to outline the actual mountains, in free flowing organic lines, using smaller brushes to achieve slightly more detail than when creating the background. Naismith then added even more detail, however he did not apply large patches of paint onto the painting, instead he created small patches, especially in the centre of the painting, then blending colours whenever needed.
In the second part of the video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4d8EP1A34g)the base and outline of the painting were completed. Naismith mostly focused on embracing the details of the painting, however only layering specific parts of the painting to not overdo the texture.
The painting is a 2D form, however by adding and layering the paint over the mountain has clearly added some effect as to depth and 3D form, this was also achieve through successful built up, blending of different tones and colours, to create a light effect which makes the painting look more realistic, especially sky wise.
Composition wise the centre of the painting is supposedly the start point of the painting, as by applying most of the built up bright colours on the middle mountain Naismith was trying to highlight that the viewers should focus on the mountain, it also creates an effect due to this mountain appearing to be closer it is more sharp in detail and so the mountains in the background are blurred and only there to fill in the background like camera only focusing on one point. This is clever because there is already so much colours, patterns and tones used in the painting, so to prevent the viewers eye from being distracted or confused by so much in the painting, it helps to have something stand out in particular to even out the contrast.
Overall the key aspects of ‘Sisters of Glencoe’ and other paintings by Naismith is overtime layering which requires time and patience, it is also important to use a variety of tools as this allows to create various marks ant textures that add personality to the painting.
This is why Naismith is a good artist to experiment with the style of, as it would allow me to think of different ways to apply media and to built it up for a end result.
I also found an artist named
I also found an artist named
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