Poetry and painting share some DNA. To feel what’s in a painting, you must “read” it first – which means you must look closely with an emotional and imaginative eye at what the artist gives [...]

#1. Look Close, See Big “I wish you could see what I see out the window,” wrote Georgia O’Keeffe to her friend, the painter Arthur Dove in 1942. At 55 years old, she was writing [...]

Have you ever stood listening in the winter night air for an owl somewhere off in the distance, surprised by the sound of your breathing, feeling the cold seeping into your feet? Why does that [...]

by Nancy Macdonald On site, I make a number of sketches and color studies, which I use as reference for larger paintings in my studio. I try to capture the harmony in the scene as [...]

A brilliant and prolific artist, Tom Thomson (1877–1917) painted lush, modernist celebrations of the Canadian wilderness en plein air. Thomson hiked and canoed to his locations, but his work doesn’t match up with what we [...]

"It has always seemed to me that a picture does not rest upon beauty alone." - John Carlson Paintings, like people, have an outer surface that they present to the world and an "inner life" [...]

Join us as Skip Whitcomb takes us on an insightful dive into what catches his eye when judging an art competition and how participants can make the most of jumping in. Mr. Whitcomb is an [...]

Just three words, LOOKING, THINKING, and PAINTING can radically change your artistic approach, your career, even as your life. It sounds gimmicky but it happened that way for me. Years ago, I shared some developing [...]

What a harvest is here in this still-life painting by the Flemish Baroque-period painter Jan Davidsz. de HEEM (1606-1684): a wooden table draped with a gold-fringed green velvet cloth, a glass of white wine and a [...]