Is anyone as much of the paint slob as I am?
 

I confess. I am a paint slob. I tend to work on larger panels. My current painting is 30" x 56". After I have worked out my composition, I slash on the paint to block in the color with the result that I get paint on myself, the floor and occasionally the wall.

Knowing this rather exuberant side of myself, I put in a WilsonArt, burled cherry, high-pressure laminate floor in my studio. It is almost impervious to anything I can do to it. I can even use acetone to clean paint off the floor without doing any damage to the floor. Unfortunately I seem to be doing too much cleaning. So back to the old rug trick.

As I was walking through the Great Indoors store, I saw they had a beautiful 6' x 8' Karistan oriental rug marked down from $700 to $90. It now lives under my Hughes 4000 easel. My only problem is, that it is so beautiful, I find myself being more cautious as a painter. I think I'm just going to have to throw some paint on the rug and get it over with.

Is there anyone else as much of a paint slob as I am?

I definitely am. When I paint plein air I use so many paper towels that I think I kill more trees than I paint!

My studio is definitely not a lovely showplace, since there's paint on most surfaces, too.

My son has come in to my studio and laughed at me more than once - the paint gets on my hands and then I unconsciously touch my face with it as I am working. One time it was a bold streak of Prussian Blue on the cheek and under one eye. I get paint on clothes too, so old blue jeans/top/apron help.

I am in awe of people who can paint in good clothes and not get a speck out of place.

I don't know if you've ever seen Lucien Freud's studio? It's walls and floor are grimly covered with paint and with rags for wiping brushes. Quite astonishing - but that's what you get, I think, for being completely focussed.

Here's a link to an image of his studio with a portrait of David Hockney and David Hockney himself.

I have a friend from my university days who visited Lucien Freud in his studio at midnight one night in London (quite an appropriate time to be visiting the studio I think!). She commented too that she had never seen or imagined so many paint brushes in her life. He had boxes and boxes of paintbrushes in addition to all the used and soon-to-be-used paintbrushes in jars. Another example of his unwavering focus and vision.

Not a beautiful painter. His attitude is one of a workman. A sheer determination to get the work done. A steadily dogged searching for form and tone over months and years. No frivolities. No decoration. Not a polite conversational painter in the least. But he is certainly poetic, and his poetry lies in his gut-grabbing response to the tonal relationships of the human form. A response that is far beyond mere sensitivity. It is the thing on which he focuses all his religious and philosophical energies. Not at all a lovely painter, but I do feel, with recently renewed conviction, a very, very great one.

He didn't paint my friend (although she would have made a great Freud portrait) - she was only in London for about a week.

Michelle and Julie - it is comforting to know that I'm in such good company.

Thomasin - Your link to Lucian Freud's studio made my day. I now feel like a compulsive neatnik by comparison. Personally, I could never work under those kinds of conditions, but I do think it reflects Lucian Freud's personality. To each his own.

I can't say I'm a neatnik . . . I have lots of "neatness" issues, but I do try to keep paint under reasonable control (on or off the canvas). If you never paint anything larger than a 22x28", that's kind of in the same category as being able to eat in polite company without getting food all over yourself and your dinner companions . . . the larger the piece, the more likely you are to drop paint. Richard's 30x56" is definitely in the latter category. How about this? I paint one day a week in a gallery with nice carpeting. I use a couple of old bed-sheets for a drop-cloth, and they've "saved" me more than once!

Years of doing commercial work imposed "neatness" on me under duress. For some strange reason, clients just aren't very understanding when you drop as much paint on floors and furnishings as you use on the project itself!

As for Freud, I suppose there's a "romantic bohemian ambience" that attends the condition of his studio, and certainly the fame and prestige he enjoys will make that seem "kewl" . . . But! If you paint portrait commissions from life sittings in your own studio, that nice Oriental rug and snazzy easel (sans gobs of paint spills) will speak more highly of your ability than piles of old rags and painty handprints on every surface one touches. . . JMHO.

Hi,
I guess that I am in the "Richard Bingham category" regarding paint action outside the frame. I am trained for painting doors, not floors and carpets, it has become a habit and not something that I think about allot.

By the way, this Freud studio photo look arranged to me, almost surreal; the easel untouched by paint with the finished painting on it and the painter coming into the studio ready to get started.

I am also fascinated by Freud and think this is a very fine portrait and painting.

The light in the studio is ideal, I'd wish that it was my studio.

That was my thought, as well - how could Freud's easel be so pristine, yet everything else be completely and thoroughly covered?

I remember a photo Nicolas Uribe once posted - it was of him sitting at his easel - he and his wife were getting ready to go out for the evening, but he felt compelled to work on his painting while she was still getting ready. Rather than get paint on his slacks, he slipped them off and was painting in his shorts, socks, dress shoes, etc.

I try to keep myself from slinging paint, since my studio is in my basement. I want to keep the art materials where they belong, and not track anything into my house.

My working space has to be well organized and very clean or I start to hyperventilate! LOL ;)

I'm like Enzie, I work best in a clean ordered environment. And I painted plein air with Michele last fall, she had the biggest trash bag I've ever seen! I think she used as many paper towels as the rest of the group put together.

That reminds me - what do you do with the used paper towels? Is is totally wrong of me to put them in the compost recycling bin? Would it kill rather than feed the environment? (I use tons too)

I don't know what the answer is to the paper towel question.

I do know that every time I start a new project in my little studio, I go through the ritual of cleaning and preparing. Which means it must be vacuumed and neat.

I am in the "Jekyll and Hyde" category of neatness.

I am always surprised at how much paint I end up with on myself, so I usually wear one of my husband's old shirts as a smock. Since he goes through a lot of them, I don't worry about big splotches of cad orange. I can't seem to avoid getting paint on my easel, but I try to wipe it down so there aren't globs of paint all over it. Giant drop cloths for the floor are handy on occasion. So is barrier cream for hands!

Every now and then I can no longer stand the mess, usually after searching fruitlessly for some thing or other. I then clean and organize fanatically. Sadly, I can never seem to maintain perfect order. I still dream of finding the ideal system!

I recently read an interesting book titled "A Perfect Mess" which posits that the costs of maintaining order are higher than the benefits gained. I know I have probably spent time cleaning up my studio that I could have used more wisely to finally finish my latest painting. I think there may be a little procrastination involved wherein, right now, cleaning up my studio is less painful than figuring out what to do with my portrait.

A female master Wang Shuhui http://www.artnet.com/Artists/LotDet...9D38A85415EB2E
and Norman Rockwell agree with you.

In any production situation, when things are truly busy, "housekeeping" is the first thing to go. I can "buy" the premise of maintenance costs outweighing benefits only so far as the mess remains "orderly" enough to keep the work-flow at full efficiency.

I know for sure when I start finding studio chores that are "absolutely necessary", it's because they're such a safe refuge from the terrors of having to deal with paintings that have stalled . . . I could "neatly" procrastinate myself into never picking up a brush again!

Richard - Your last paragraph should be imortalized in the book of truths. When I am doing studio clean-up it is usually for just this reason.

One of these days I will figure out how to properly insert a quote or delete a posting. It just won't be today.

That's my philosopy, too-- as those who have seen my less-than-tidy studio can attest!

I saw a documentary on a recently deceased Irish artist (London Based) which described how archaeologists were recording the contents of his studio/home prior to moving it to Dublin.
I can't remember his name at the moment, but he was quite famous and suffered severely from asthma.
I think he had not thrown out a rag, a brush, an empty tube, anything at all for his entire life.
There was mountains of stuff piled on every surface. Empty and half completed canvases stacked against walls, and piled to the ceiling. There was a little track through it all which allowed him to move from his bed to his easel to his bathroom to his stove.
The museum mapped every little item, numbered everything, packed all his rubbish reverentially into little plastic bags, and then into padded foam boxes ready to be transported and reconstructed, complete with dust and grime, in the studio's new home. I immediately went into my studio and had a big cleanup.
I don't think I would like to be that famous!!!!

... "Irish artist? - do you mean Bacon?

I wonder if painters are more prone to hoarding tendencies than the general population?

I know I am quite averse to discarding empty jars, film cannisters, old clothing for rags, outdated telephone books for cleaning brushes, packing materials and such, since I often have a need for such items. I try to periodically organize all this stuff into containers to eliminate the visual clutter and make them easier to find when I do need them.

A person who is unable to let go of empty paint tubes may need some professional help.

True junk, that is neither useful or beautiful, I have no problem chucking.

I think that certain artists who are totally focussed cannot be distracted from their work and the necessity of getting down their ever-flowing ideas. So cleaning up their studios is despairing to them as it means sacrificing so much time that could be used for their work. When I am on a roll every now and again everything goes to pot - the house, the studio, the garden, the meals, because it becomes almost painful to stop what I am doing with my painting.

Luckily though, like today for instance, tidying-up, cleaning, gardening, etc. puts me wonderfully on a roll of organisation and then nothing gets in the way of that. Its a great way to give you mental space to think, tidying-up is. Any repetitive, rhythmical physical activity does this, I think. I used to study for exams by playing tennis against a wall just to keep my body from being too restless - repeat a fact 10 times for every ten tennis strokes played.

Artists like Bacon and Freud were / are on a constant painting roll, with so very much to say and so little time to waste not doing it.

A few days ago, I checked out out a couple of books from the library by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. The first is titled, "Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience" and the other is "Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention".

These books discuss the state of focus and complete concentration Thomasin describes as being "on a roll". When painting, we can enter such a state that a whole day can pass by in what seems like very little time. It is very frustrating to be deprived of the time to enter that state of "flow".

I envy the men you speak of, to be able to paint without interruption whenever they wished without worrying about the needs of anyone else. For most female artists with families, this is not very often a realistic option.

Thomasin, I get your point that Francis Bacon was singleminded in his focus on his art and empty paint tubes were of no relevance to him. However, with regard to his psychological state, if his paintings and living conditions are anything to go by, I would say he definitely had some issues - but hey, who doesn't?

Please forgive my vague moment. It was Francis Bacon I was referring to. I have just done a quick search on him and have decided now I am not cleaning my studio ever again. All my detritis could be worth a fortune to my estate. I've had it wrong all this time. I have tried to preserve the integrity of my house for future sale value.

It seems there have been many people who have profited from Bacon's rubbish, from the photographer who recorded the studio and then published a book, to those who collected his rejected canvases, mostly with the offending areas cut out of them, to those who recorded the various documentaries. It seems that anything he once touched is collectable.

These are the pertinent words, Laurel. The demands of serving such a paramour as "Art" to the fullest extent of one's being rather precludes having a family, and makes it something akin to joining a celibate priesthood. Michelangelo, Homer and Sargent come to mind as three who followed that course.

The lives of the masters amply illustrate how frustrations of family and interpersonal responsibility complicate "the process" : Rembrandt, Vermeer, Monet, and Rodin, for example. There are those who cheerfully (?) dispensed with the distractions . . . Gaugin, for one, and my personal favorite, Pisarro, who continued painting, apparently undeterred by any distresses arising from the reality that his starving wife and children had nothing to eat . . .

Richard, please pardon me for leaving the guys out of it! Your post was most amusing. You are, of course, right in that male artists with families who are conscientious about their responsibilities are also limited in their ability to devote themselves without distraction to their work.

Remaining single is a great benefit for either sex when it comes to the singleminded pursuit of reaching your potential in painting. Mary Cassatt and Cecilia Beaux spring immediately to mind as examples of women who consciously chose to remain single. Being wealthy, having a supportive spouse and household help never hurts either, which was true for the French Impressionist, Berthe Morisot.

Maybe being a bit of a "paint slob" is not such a bad thing in the long run. Maybe we should be ignoring the mess to focus on more important tasks, no matter what our circumstances. Trying to keep our surroundings in order is a thankless task somewhat akin to shovelling snow in a never ending storm and perhaps the less time devoted to it, the better for our productivity!

Good thoughts, Laurel, I much enjoyed your posts. The other side of the coin is there were many who appear to have been capable of balancing home and family with the serious pursuit of art . . . like Liz 'n' Bill Bouguereau . . .

As you aptly pointed out, comfortable circumstances are always a plus, and they certainly enjoyed that! (Jeeves, the studio will require your attention when I've finished for the day . . . ) ;)