Class Notes - June 23, 2010

• Be your own best teacher
• Engage in ongoing research on yourself, the materials you use, and the world around you.
• Use other teachers as fodder for own research
• It's your responsibility to extract as much out of the experience as possible
• Sometimes that will mean asking a lot of questions
• Sometimes that will mean shutting up and listening/watching as much as possible
• If the teacher is terrible, look for other students to learn from
• Don't sit around like a baby bird and wait to get fed.
• On the other hand, don't reinvent the wheel
• Study with the best you can find.  Do research about what that means.
• I've found the best way to learn is to just accept what the teacher says and do it- even if it conflicts with something another teacher has told you, or that you've found to be true in your own research.
• Of course there's some threshold to this, but the point is to get as much from the teacher as possible.  Being cocky might deprive you of learning something new, finding out that something you thought was right is actually incorrect or incomplete.
  
• However, don't drink the Kool-Aid.
• It's being passed out in spades in the art world.
• Be especially aware of disciples of the teacher, who are often the biggest dealers of Kool-Aid.
• And don't think that classes with anybody will make up for time in front of the easel.
• Knowledge is cheap- you just need to come across it and then you have it.  There is no replacement for experience.
•  You can be unaware of a fact or have it wrong for years, and then come across the correct information.  Then you'll just have it (provided that a] you're willing to take the time to understand it properly, and b] you're not too proud to admit you were wrong)
• However, you can't slack off practicing, say, your brush-handling skills for years, and then suddenly read something that gets you to the level you would be at if you'd been practicing that whole time.
• Developing sensitivity
• You can't learn sensitivity from a book.
• Develop a way to test yourself so you can track your progress.
• Also, if you tried something new you can see if it helped or hindered you.
• Practice!  There's just no way around it...
• Use an old phone book instead of paper towels when possible.
• If you want certain results, you have to be willing to put in a certain amount of work and care to achieve them.
• Do you think Van Dyck's palette was a mess, or that he worked haphazardly?
• Create a situation that gives you the best chance to achieve what you're going for.
•  Checking against swatches
• When checking colors against a swatch, put a small bit of paint directly on the swatch, and make sure the paint is smooth and flat.  Highlights and bumps on the paint can distort your perception of what color the paint was.
• If your swatches are under glass, be aware that glass is usually slightly green and will also shift the value of the swatch.
• Reflections on the glass will distort  your perception of the values.  Use a black board to eliminate as much reflection as possible.
• Also be aware of the shadow casting from the paint to the surface below the glass.  This shadow can distort your perception of value.
• You can't expect perfect objectivity, but you can set up situations where you're more likely to achieve it or encounter it.
• Give yourself the best chance to be objective.
• Get your rough draft down before you start editing individual paragraphs and sentences
• You need to view each individual part relative to the whole
• When mixing strings, for example, don't start correcting individual mixtures until you've got a mixture for each step in the string.
• Asking "What did we learn in class today?" at the end of class is helpful for both students and teacher.