A presentation that outlines two assignments on paint handling and how to handle paint. Students are offered a choice between the two styles and are allowed to explore them in a painting. They must follow the individual objectives and criteria for each assignment.

1. Paint HandlingImpressionistic/Hard-edged

2. Impressionist painting- Criteria &
Objectives
• Students must paint a natural/real subject in the style of the impressionists.
• Students may use hog hair bristle brushes, acrylic or water based oil paint, painting supplies, and
a photographic reference
• Students must use a real photographic reference of a real person place or thing shot in natural
sunlight.
• Students must use short choppy, quick strokes. Students must change colors every stroke or every
set of strokes, only large brushes, size 6 and up may be used.
• Students are not allowed to use black, paint can be mixed on the palette or on the canvas.
Students may not use black, any use of black to darken a color will be instantly downgraded.
• Students may use a support of their choice, canvas is recommended if water miscible oils are to
be used.
• Students can subjectively match colors, for instance: haystacks are not entirely purple but Monet
made them purple to convey shadows. Purple assisted his view of a darker side of the haystack.
• The objective of this assignment is to mix darks with only pure colors, paint in in an
impressionistic style, and render a subject in natural light.

3. Typical impressionist setup
• Stiff bristles, hog hair flats
• Held at end of handle
• Short quick choppy flicks or
strokes
• Change colors every stroke
or set of strokes
• Mix wet into wet
• Natural light source
• No black
• No black
• No black
• If I see black I will
downgrade you

4. Impressionism
1870’s-1880’s

5. Claude Monet, Agapanthus triptych

6. 1 2
3 4
5

7. GivernyWater Lilies
Monet, 1906.

8. Claude Monet, self portrait
1840-1926.

9. Claude Monet, Impression, Sunrise

10. Claude Monet, Arrival At Saint Lazare Station

11. Claude
Monet, Lady in the
Garden

12. Claude
Monet, Landsca
pe With
Thunderstorm

13. Claude
Monet, San
Giorgio Maggiore

14. Claude Monet, Rouen Cathedral,
The Portal and the Tour d'Albane,
FullSunlight

15. Rouen Cathedral: The Portal
Monet, 1894.
Oil on canvas, 3’3” x 2’2”.

16. Monet, Haystacks

18. The Bath
Mary
Cassatt, 1892.
Oil on canvas.
3’3” x 2’2”

19. Mother and Child
Mary
Cassatt, 1890.
Oil on canvas.
3’11” x 2’1”

20. Berthe Morisot, 1841-
1895
In the Dining Room,1886,
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art

21. Summer’s Day
Berthe Morisot, 1879.
Oil on canvas.

22. Wooded Landscape at
l’Hermitage
Camille Pissarro, 1878. Oil on
canvas, 18” x 22”.

23. Pissarro, Old Chelsea
Bridge, London 1871, Smith
College Museum of Arts

24. Pissarro, Conversation, c. 1881

25. Pissarro, Boulevard Montmartre la nuit, 1898

26. Pissarro, The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter
Morning, 1897, Metropolitan Museum of Art

27. Pissarro, Boulevard
Montmartre au
printemps

28. Pierre- Auguste Renoir.
The Swing.
Luncheon at the Boating
Party.

29. Renoir
Le Moulin de la Galette
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1876.
Oil on canvas, 4’3” x 5’8”.

30. DegasRehearsal on Stage
Edgar Degas, 1874.
Pastel over brush and-ink drawing
on thin, cream-colored
paper, mounted on canvas.
21” x 28”.

31. DegasPortrait of Mary Cassatt
Degas, 1884. Oil on canvas.
28” x 23”.

32. Degas, Dancers in Pink II

33. Degas, Ballet Rehearsal, 1875

34. Manet
Boating
Edouard Manet, 1874. Oil on canvas. 38” x 51”.

35. Manet
A Bar at the Folies Bergere
Manet, 1882. Oil on canvas. 3’1” x 4’3”.

36. John Singer Sargent, The Sketchers

37. John Singer
Sargent, Portrait of Lady
Agnew of Lochnaw

38. Post-Impressionism
Mid 1880’s-1910-ish

39. Georges Seurat, 1884-1886

46. Paul Signac "Le Palais des Papes, Avignon (The Papal Palace, Avignon)", c.1900 - oil
on canvas, 73.5-92.5 cm. - Paris, Musée d'Orsay

50. Georges Lemmen

54. Student Examples

63. Hard edge painting- Criteria & Objectives
• Students must make a hard edge abstract painting. Their painting must have perfectly hard, straight
edges, four colors, each color must be varied in saturation, value, and intensity ten different ways. The
design must be decidedly concentric/symmetrical or asymmetrical.
• Students must use acrylic paint, four tube colors, black and white, synthetic bristle brushes, masking
tape, ruler, and graphite with other painting supplies. Bristol or poster board will be used cut to a small
quarter sheet square.
• Students must paint with crisp straight edges, no undulations, quivers, stray
marks, overlap, drips, bleeding, bristle drags, or errant marks may appear. Masking tape may be used to
make crisp edges.
• Students must make an informed and decisive choice to pursue a concentric symmetrical design or an
asymmetrical design. Concentric is aesthetically pleasing, balanced, and easy to paint as each quadrant is
identical. Asymmetrical, while more free requires more planning and balance, odd shapes often result which
are harder to paint with crisp edges.
• Students must use ten steps of value or ten variations in saturation/intensity. Students must use at least four
different tube colors, colors cannot be within the same hue category, for instance a student cannot claim to
have used ultramarine and pthalo blue as two separate colors. Students may use white, black, and grey to
create various mixtures of their four colors.
• The objective of this lesson is to explore subjective choices in value to create an aesthetically pleasing
painting, create a geometric abstract composition, and create hard edges.

64. Step by step, how to make a concentric design
Example of coloration using ten steps of value, with two out of the four colors

65. Asymmetrical abstract painting, sketch process

66. To paint with masking tape follow these steps
1. Place the tape down along the edges of your design, burnish edges to form a tight seal
2. It is optional but you can further seal edges of tape with acrylic mediums, (we don’t currently own any)
3. Paint a nice even coat of paint over tap edge, peel back at a sharp angle

67. Student Examples

69. Artists that exemplify the
assignment’s criteria

70. Victor Vasarely

71. Richard Anuszkiewicz

72. Julian Hoeber

73. Liviu Stoicoviciu

74. Ralph Berko
Example of asymmetrical composition
with multiple shifts in value, saturation,
and color.

75. What is commonly thought of
as the hard edge painting
style
These artists are ordered semi-chronologically from the 30’s on up into
contemporary time, most typically hard-edge painting is thought of as happening
around the 60’s and 70’s

76. Piet Mondrian

77. Wassillie Kandinsky

78. Max Bill

79. Sol LeWitt

80. Frank Stella

81. William T. Williams

82. Bridget Riley,

83. Charles Biederman

84. Sarah Morris

85. Jaro

86. Artists who use bands or lines of
color

87. Gene Davis

88. Dion Johnson

89. Israel Guevara

90. Andrew Kuo

91. Artists who use a lot of geometric
shapes

92. Alison Rash

93. James Marshall (Dalek)

94. William J. O'Brien

95. James Kennedy

96. Artists who use very simple
geometric shapes

97. Josef Albers

98. Ellsworth Kelly

99. Robert Mangold

100. Sam Gilliam

101. Alain Biltereyst

102. Qian Jiahua

103. Artists who abstract
letters, numbers and other
symbols

104. Allan Graham

105. Robert Indiana

106. Karlos Carcamo

107. Valerie Jaudon

108. Artists who use organic or
natural shapes in a hard edge
style

109. Carla Accardi

110. Richard Woods

111. Kate Abercrombie

112. Michelle Hinebrook

113. Pete Smith

114. Todd Pospichal

115. Artists whose color does not
remain flat, but looks like hard
edge style

116. Yusuke Komuta

117. Renata Egreja

118. Nichole van Beek

119. Laura Owens

120. James Welling, photographs with double exposures