Harold Speed

[Steven Sweeney]

The two "bibles", if you will, of the studio in which I received most of my training were both written by Harold Speed -- "The Practice and Science of Drawing" and "Oil Painting Techniques and Materials". Dover editions of both are available from Amazon.com.

They are, simply, exactly what the titles say they are, but in such remarkable depth -- informative, instructive, thought-provoking -- without a single superfluous sentence, remark, or observation, that they could sustain a multi-year study of the subjects. I know extraordinarily competent artists who would consider themselves negligent (and foolish) not to revisit these books periodically, as only the intervening periods of hands-on experience will fully illuminate all that is presented by the author.

"Beach reads" they're not. Just to take an example, visitors to the Portrait Critiques area of SOG will have often seen me writing about "overmodeling" in certain areas of a drawing or painting. This is a small part of Speed's remarks on the subject:

[W]hile studying the gradations of tone that express form and give the modelling, you should never neglect to keep the mind fixed upon the relationship the part you are painting bears to the whole picture. * * * It is one of the most difficult things to decide the amount of variety and emphasis allowable for the smaller parts of a picture, so as to bring all in harmony with that oneness of impression that should dominate the whole[.} In the best work, the greatest economy is exercised in this respect, so that as much power may be kept in reserve as possible.

This illuminating instruction -- that a successful drawing or painting is not a jigsaw of a large number of smaller, "complete" drawings or paintings, but is an entirety in which the parts are unified and harmonized, all in deliberate and thoughtful relation to one another -- is something that can take very long to assimilate and put into practice. Attentive reading of Speed's books will shorten the time between the serious student's first creative impulses and eventual command of design and materials.

[Margaret Elvin]

These books sound worthwhile, not just for the enlightening quote you extracted, but also because if they have helped inform your own ability to critique, which I and so many others respect, then I'm sure there is much to be gleaned from them. Thanks for the suggestions.

-Margaret

[Chris Kolupski]

Steven, I wholeheartedly agree about Speed's books. His oil painting book is absolutely the finest book I've read on the subject. For having no colorplates, it is still remarkably absorbing due to Speed's sharply defined ideas and vivid prose. Many times I literally laughed out loud at hearing him nail a dodgy ineffable art concept with a deft metaphor. So many times did I feel him put my own half-realized painting discoveries into terse little axioms. The book is full of "so that's why I do that's" and "aha's".

A thoroughly enjoyable must-read.

[Valentino Radman]

Both books are among the best I've read on the subject, though written eight or so decades ago (or maybe just because of it).

[Michele Rushworth]

Thanks, Steven, for these recommendations. I had never heard of these books.

On your suggestion, I put them on my Christmas wish list and my husband got them for me. I started with the drawing one and am enjoying it immensely. (Gives me something useful to do to in the evenings when there's nothing worthwhile on TV -- which is most of the time -- and when I'm too tired to paint!)

[Denise Hall]

I am reading the Harold Speed book on oil painting right now and I wish I could find more time to read instead of work/teach/paint so I could finish it. It really is so "in depth" compared to anything else I have read regarding technique.

Mr. Speed seems to be talking to you while you are reading it - as if he is teaching you in a classroom and lecturing - yet, it's very informal. One part I just read about color, for example, tells about when he was painting William Holman Hunt (Pre-Raphaelite fame); while he was painting him - Holman Hunt told him of the technique the Pre-Raphaelites used to draw/underpaint. Being a Pre-Raph nut myself, I was just in awe and for some reason, had never heard this before.

He seems to be covering everything I need right now to spur me on at the easel.

Marvin Mattelson talks so much about this book and I see why now that I ordered it!

Thank you one more time, Mr. Mattelson.

[Marvin Mattelson]

Thanks Denise. I highly recommend Harold Speed to all my students since he is so wonderfully succinct and he obviously knows his stuff.

My only objection is that Dover Books chose to put a Sargent portrait on the cover of the painting book and not one of Harold's.

[Mari DeRuntz]

My only objection is that Dover Books chose to put a Sargent portrait on the cover of the painting book and not one of Harold's.

YES, I thought that was odd, too. I can't recall ever seeing an original Harold Speed, but will research it further. Allan Banks mentioned that he stumbled across one in a gallery in New York once, and was mesmerized.

In the spirit of "youth is wasted on the young," I'd love to be able to now revisit all of the paintings I've looked at in my life. In the same vein, everytime I read a passage from Speed, I get something different out of it, things I was unable to see previously.

This book belongs on the nightstand of every painter.

Anyway, the Sargent on the cover looks to be painted in the manner of a simple three-color study, similar to the head study Speed walks the reader through in a step-by-step included in the text (cool black, red and ochre, plus white). So, it's not a COMPLETELY out-of-context cover.

[Steven Sweeney]

Our use of Speed's Oil Painting Techniques book was in part out of interest in what he had to say about a variety of painters' work.** Indeed, Dover's own press describes the book as including "expert analysis of work of Velasquez, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Hals, Rembrandt" and others. So the cover might have shown any of such works as Speed regarded to be exemplary, since he was not apparently purporting to write a book only about his own work. Nonetheless, the book curiously makes scant mention of Sargent.

Perhaps there is some Dover lore extant about the development of the cover. I've put in an enquiry to Dover's editorial department and will dutifully return with any reply I receive.

** (For the possible interest of the aficionado and collector, we similarly consulted the hard-to-find "The Classic Point of View" by Kenyon Cox, published around the same time as Speed's book. These are essays often spare in praise and edgy in condemnation. (One well-known historical work is referred to as "immortally absurd".)

[Steven Sweeney]

As anticipated, Dover replies:

Thank you for your message asking for information regarding the cover of our "Oil Painting Techniques" book.

Unfortunately, there is no way to reconstruct the reasons why a certain picture was chosen for one of our covers. However, it is possible we did not have a good transparency of one of the author's paintings to work from.

I say "as anticipated," because I once worked in editorial at a publishing company where a friend was the production editor for a college-level art overview text. Watching the decision-making process relating to the book's cover art was a bit like watching the grinding of sausage bits. (Poor productions values in the first run off the presses nearly cost jobs and certainly spoiled careers.) All editors involved -- and their story, should someone write in to ask about it -- have long since moved on.