the atelier method

64 Artists & Illustrators

The Atelier Method
I
remember in my pre-art school days
there were moments when I saw a
face or gure of such beauty that
I wanted to capture it in some
permanent way. I could photograph it
but I wanted more I wanted to paint
it. When I tried to do so, there was
always such a discouraging gap
between the beauty of the person
I was painting and what I actually
produced on canvas.
I went in search of a school that
could teach me how to close that gap.
Unfortunately, I couldnt nd it in the
UK. Most schools only taught the
modern and the conceptual, the art of
our time, which, though fascinating
and thought provoking, didnt help me
in my mission to capture that beauty.
I needed a school that could teach
traditional skills; to see proportions,
contrasts, line and volume. I was
lucky to nd such a school in Spain
PROPORTION
and I studied there for some years.
I say lucky because that school
saved me so much time. I could have
spent a lifetime of trial and error to
discover for myself a body of principles
that already existed and it would have
been like reinventing the wheel.
Years later, when working in London
as a professional artist, I met two
other artists, Scott Pohlschmidt and
Ann Witheridge, who had enjoyed a
similarly traditional training in Italy.
The three of us also had a similar
outlook on teaching art in a practical
capacity. We recognised that effective
training in ne art skills had not just
been declining in the UK, but had
almost disappeared completely. We
also knew that as few established
artists now take pupils, the studio or
atelier chain that stretched back to
the early Middle Ages and along
which knowledge was passed from
master to apprentice over countless
generations, has been broken. So we
decided to set up our own art school
to teach aspiring artists within the
atelier tradition and by November
2004, the Lavender Hill Studios were
open for teaching.
At Lavender Hill, we breakdown the
teaching of art into four basic stages:
1. Proportion
2. Line and volume (or gesture)
3. Chiaroscuro (or light and shade)
4. Colour

Professional artists regularly use all
these elements simultaneously.
However, by studying each principle
individually, you can develop a greater
understanding of the process and see
clearly how each stage naturally leads
into the next. In this article, we will be
looking in depth at the rst principle:
ABOVE Scott
Pohlschmidt,
Muller, oil on
canvas
In our new series, Lavender Hill Studios Nick Bashall introduces a four-point plan for artistic
success, before fellow tutor Ann Witheridge guides us through an exercise in proportion
the atelier method
Artists & Illustrators 65
proportion. Over the course of the
subsequent articles, we will look in
turn at the remaining three stages,
before rounding off the ve-part
series with a painting demonstration
that shows how one might combine
and consider each element in a single
portrait sitting.
Workshop 1
In order to accurately capture the
likeness of an object or person, one
needs to accurately reproduce the
distances between the features. For
example, let us say you want to draw
a standing nude. You need to ensure
certain elements are in proportion,
such as whether the hips are the right
distance between the head and the
feet or whether the chin is the right
distance between the breasts and the
top of the head.
To achieve this, you could project a
photograph on a screen and trace the
lines. Or you could measure from life
the distance between each feature of
the subject by holding out your
paintbrush and closing one eye.
The other alternative is to use the
sight-size method: in other words,
placing the model alongside the
canvas and measuring him or her up
with a horizontal stick held at arms
length. You could take a line from the
top of the models head/shoulders/
buttocks/feet straight onto your
canvas. This is a brilliant system and
has been much used by artists since
Renaissance times; many of the great
portrait painters such as Philip de
Lszl and John Singer Sargent used
it, though not exclusively.
This method does have drawbacks,
too. The model must remain still and
it is not very useful when you are
painting a horizontal nude, a group
composition or a landscape. When
used in conjunction with a plumb
line, it hinders the ow of
spontaneous drawing.
All of the above systems are useful,
not to mention tried and tested.
However, there is another brilliantly
simple yet little-known system that
has also been used for many years.
In Spain, they called it encajar,
which translates as to encase. The
idea being that you take the subject
matter whether it be a still life or a
landscape, a gure or a face and
you encase or envelope it with lines.
ENCASING A COMPOSITION
To demonstrate encasing, we often
set up a composition of ve or more
white boxes (see page 66). Without
explaining how or why, we ask students
to draw them. They will always, almost
without exception, draw one box at a
time. That is when we begin to
introduce the principles outlined
above. Doing this encourages them
to see the whole composition before
concentrating on individual parts.
1
In this example, drawn by student
Joni Duarte, weve taken a basic
still life composition of a bottle and a
jug. On your page, draw a horizontal
line at the bottom and another at the
top, as shown. These two initial lines
represent the limits of the
composition and they will never
change; every other major line will lie
between them.
2
Now draw two vertical lines to
represent the lateral extremes of
the whole composition, as shown. This
is your box. The aim of this exercise is
for you try to visualise this whole box
at the outset.
3
You then divide that whole space
into two by a horizontal line,
representing the top of the shorter
jug. Somewhere between the top and
the bottom lines is the third line, the
top of the jug.
You dont need to measure this.
Whether an artist or not, we all have
that instinct in us to put the line in
more or less the right place.
4
Then you put in your third vertical,
dividing up the whole box
longitudinally. In making this third
vertical line, you ignore the third
horizontal line you applied earlier.
5
You can then further sub-divide
these two boxes into smaller
areas as shown. If you then draw or
paint within this initial scaffolding of
lines, your artwork should remain
roughly proportional throughout.
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the atelier method
66 Artists & Illustrators
DIAGONALS
Having previously drawn a scaffolding
of the whole composition in horizontal
and vertical lines only, we can now
introduce diagonal lines. You can do
this simply by selecting a single object
with curves such as a bottle. Start as
before by encasing the whole object
with four lines: top, bottom, left and
right. Next, place a horizontal line
where the body of the bottle begins to
narrow down into the neck, and then
a second horizontal line at the base
of the neck. You can then insert a
couple of vertical lines to mark out
the neck. Diagonals can then be
drawn between the second and third
horizontal lines. The actual curve of
the bottle can be shaped more
accurately in relation to this diagonal.
The bottle is a symmetrical object.
You can apply the same principle to
an asymmetrical object that has
curves for example, a puddle of
water. You can also apply it to multiple
objects: in the example opposite, you
will notice how you can show that the
vase is in front of the bottle. In other
words, you can use this system to
show perspective.
You can use the same technique in
most situations, from landscapes to
gurative compositions. The point is
that however complex the subject is
before you, you can simplify it by
breaking it down into its biggest
parts from the outset.
It should be noted that the purpose
of these early lines the verticals,
horizontals and diagonals is only to
create scaffolding on which the later
stages of the picture will be built.
These lines need only take minutes to
render but to put them in the right
places, takes a bit of practise and
repetition. It can be difcult at rst to
discipline your mind to see the whole
before you focus on the parts.
This method outlined above merely
describes the starting point how we
can approach our drawing or painting
at the outset. We can trust our
instincts to see the whole and then
the bigger parts before the details.
This method of encasing an object
and drawing in the diagonals in the
early stages of a picture may at rst
seem mathematical and unexciting,
but the opposite is true the
technique relies on your natural
instinct and provides, at these early
stages, a much greater freedom
than stied measuring.
Detail and greater accuracy come
later, as you progress on to the stages
that will be outlined in the next three
articles. Together these four
principles will give you the basic
grammar of the visual language.
Learning this grammar better equips
us to play with what we see before
our eyes or in our imagination. Play
is such an appropriate verb, too: you
play the piano and create beautiful
music, and with an awareness and
understanding of these basic
principles, you will be able to play
more easily with paint or pencil.
Next month: add weight to your drawings
by getting to grips with line and volume.
For more information on Lavender Hill
Studios and the courses they offer,
please visit www.lavenderhillstudios.com
BELOW With the vase in front of the bottle, the lines can be used to show perspective LEFT The
arrangement of
blocks is a useful
way to illustrate
the encasing
principle. Rather
than drawing each
individual block,
you should attempt
to view them
collectively, as
if on a grid BELOW A few simple lines can help you draw a seemingly complex arrangement of gures
BELOW Landscapes can also be simplied by creating a framework of lines
BELOW By drawing
in the horizontal
and vertical lines
of the bottle rst,
we are able to
plot the diagonal
lines and shape
the curves more
accurately in
relation to them