Plein air painters may well want to borrow a page or two from the Tonalist playbook.

I believe with Charles Herbert Woodbury (1864-1940) that “a picture is a thought or feeling expressed in terms of Nature.”

Painting from life, whether it’s a portrait or a landscape en plein air, offers the artist certain qualities of experience and knowledge that painting from photos does not.

The Hudson River painters sketched outdoors constantly, and they considered their plein air work rather like notes for larger paintings than finished work. From a contemporary plein-air perspective, you could say that what they gained in grand, cinematic depictions of composite scenery they lost in spontaneity, freshness, and immediacy.

Education is key, but learning by doing is the only way to discover what works for you and what doesn’t.

The human need to examine itself in the mirror of art begins with early civilization, and portraiture is one of its classic and oldest forms. 

A strong notan design can serve you well as a framework for building the rest of the design of any painting.

Philosopher in Meditation by Rembrandt van Rijn has become an icon of philosophy, in part, I’d argue, because of Rembrandt’s expressive use of light and shadow.

Petro Levchenko (1856 - 1917) studied in Saint Petersburg as well as in Paris and Rome during the ascendency of Impressionism.

Levitan's work is filled with profound feeling. His landscapes are meaningful beyond simply the view he's chosen to depict.