As an artist, it has been on my to-do list to copy a master's painting, in order to: practice and test my current skills, to learn more about color values and composition, to push the envelope of my limited palette usage, and finally to be among the many who have copied at least one painting (whether they admit it or not).  It definitely requires a totally different approach than creating a painting of one's own inception.  There are some who believe as a rule that one should not copy from completed paintings of any artist, living or not.  However, I have read enough to know it has been an accepted practice of artists going way back in history, including copying right in front of a painting in a museum.  Believe me, it is a daunting challenge, especially if the artist's brushstrokes are very expressive.   Nevertheless, I have thoroughly enjoyed the process of discovering what it is like to copy a master's painting and particularly of such a beautiful painting by the American figure painter, Cecilia Beaux (1855-1942).

In the summer of 1909, Cecilia Beaux began the painting: Mrs. Stedman Buttrick and Son (33.5" x 25.5"), according to the book by Sylvia Yount: Cecilia Beaux, American Figure Painter (2007). The book is from an exhibition at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, GA. (Yount's book print of the painting has a warmer tone.) Another book by Alice A. Carter: Cecilia Beaux, A Modern Painter in the Gilded Age (2005), states that the portrait was commissioned after Mrs. Buttrick died after giving birth to her fifth child and was executed from photographs.  (Carter's book print of the painting has a bluer tone.)

One hundred years later, in the fall of 2009, my artist friend, Diane Rath (www.dianerath.com) came to Michigan to teach one of her twice annual workshops.  Her project for the willing students was to copy Beaux's Mrs. Buttrick's painting during the three-day workshop.  She had color photocopies of Carter's bluer print for us to use (image size 9" x 6.5").  The first day we sketched the painting on our canvases, using the grid method, correlating the smaller grid from the source image to a larger grid on the canvas. (Diane gave me a 24" x 20" gessoed board to use. It is a different size than the original, which is a general practice and courtesy when copying.)  We then painted an underlayer using transparent earthy colors, trying to note the correct values of the painting.  The second and third day were spent applying color using Diane's suggested fuller palette of colors.

A few days later after the workshop, when I thought I was going to just touch up the painting, I realized that my drawing was way off.  Standing at a fixed easel for three days led to a massive distortion towards the bottom half of the painting.  In addition, although I painted the child's head nicely, the head too was too small.  In order to do something right (or not at all), I decided to spend the time to correct the painting, especially if I had made copying a master's painting as a goal.

Only using a bit of Diane's stand oil mixture during the workshop, the painting was now dry to the touch.  Not wanting to paint over ridges of paint, I grabbed a new Scotch-Bright scour pad and gently sanded down the painting, being careful not to breath the dust and to clean up the surrounding area.  Next, using cadmium yellow light thinned with some linseed oil, I lightly painted a new grid over the painting.  The yellow color was bright enough for the notation over both the dark and the light areas.  Then, I 'redrew' the major outlines of the shapes within the grids, still using the thinned yellow mixture.

My current palette of colors is a  red, yellow, blue, plus white palette, which I learned from Dawn Whitelaw (www.dawnwhitelaw.com) years ago.  I am very comfortable with the palette and so it is what I will use to correct and finish the painting.  Selecting just the basic color values, I paint over the major shapes within each grid and covering the added yellow outlines on the painting.  I leave what is left of the yellow grid on the background to keep the drawing in check.  The remaining yellow grid lines will be painted over when I get to re-painting the background stage.

Now, the fun truly began.  I painted in one section at a time and each section required multiple attempts.  The difficulty came when the color values were close.  The dark area of Mrs. Buttrick's face has so many subtle value changes that it probably took most of my concentration.  Each paint application had the usual decisions of hue, value, temperature, and intensity.  Then I had the added challenges of repeating Beaux's brushwork and her edges.

When I was almost done, I checked Yount's book with the warmer tones and in comparison I discovered I did not like the current coolness of the painting based on Carter's book.  (This is the problem I foresaw when I thought of copying from books and the various printing issues.)  Having not seen the original, I sensed I needed to go warmer guessing what Beaux intent was for the overall color of the painting.  So, I mixed a bit of indian yellow with some linseed oil to lightly 'stain' certain areas, mostly the skin sections.  Those areas got repainted again while still working on adjusting color values.

Also, I felt I needed to pump up the red areas, so I added a cadmium red light to my palette.  The warmer red (as opposed to my more neutral red on the palette) really helped with the child's face, and of course, the major red sleeve Mrs. Stedman has in the painting.

My last step was to repaint the background.  Again, I had to shift the color values to a warmer background, using a diluted mixture of paint and linseed oil.  It was fun using some makeup sponges to push the paint around, simulating what maybe Beaux did with big brushes.

Currently, the painting has reached a stage where it is acceptable for me to stop.  Although I know there are some remaining drawing and color value adjustments, the corrections that could be made would be minor.  My learning from the painting has been immense and now I need and want to get back to my own creations.  To finish, I'll sign the painting with "after Cecilia Beaux", given her my full respect and due credit.  Then I'll seal the painting with a coat of Gamvar (www.gamblincolors.com) and search for an appropriate frame for it.

My many thanks and appreciation go to Diane for starting me on the journey of copying a master's painting and to Cecilia Beaux.  Ms. Beaux's paintings are beautiful and I hope she would not mind.  May she rest in peace.

My past experience with varnishing my oil paintings have been mixed.  However, I just tried Gamblin's Gamvar Picture Varnish (Gamblin Artists Colors) for the first time and it turned out great.  I plan on using it for all my varnishing.  The following are the steps that I use and recommend for varnishing using Gamvar:

The supplies.    1 clean, unused brush, 1 - 2 inches in width, good quality, soft but firm texture (keep for   
                           varnishing only).  I used a new, 2-inch Langnickel gesso brush that came with a Langnickel 
                           brush set. 
                        1 clean jar with solvent to clean your varnishing brush afterward; best solvent is Gamblin's 
                           Gamsol, an odorless mineral spirits (oms); (keep the jar with the clean solvent for cleaning
                           the varnish brush only).
                        1 level surface for your painting with a layer of paper or plastic to protect the surface.
                        1 dust free room with ventilation; keep pets and curious children away from the area.
                        1 Gamvar mix; you have to add the supplied solvent to the crystals in a jar and mix for 8 hours, 
                            before you  use the Gamvar.  I did this the day before the actual varnishing. (Read the notes 
                            about the expiration of the mixed Gamvar.)
                        1-10 prepared paintings to varnish (lightly dust the dry, older paintings with a brush and check  
                            and for missed brush hairs); when the brush is wet with varnish, be ready to batch the process 
                            and save yourself setup time.
                        1 level drying area for the first hour; optional, later, prop the paintings with the varnish side 
                           towards  a wall and then the 'air dust' is less likely to land on the fresh varnish.

The process.  1. Dip your brush into the Gamvar, wetting just the tip of the brush.  A little does go a long way. 
                          I used  one brush load for an 8x10 and 2-3 brush loads for 20x24 up to 22x28. Also, try to
                          keep the lid on the varnish, to minimize evaporation and have cleaner air.  (I didn't notice any 
                          odor while varnishing - wonderful.)
                      2. Start at a corner of the painting, brush in a controlled criss-cross pattern, and try to go as far
                          as you can before reloading the brush with more varnish.  Be mindful of the coarser canvas  
                          weaves that take more brushing and watch for any pooling in areas which you brush out.
                      3. Once the painting is thoroughly covered and checked for any missed dry spots usually near the
                          edges, you can stop brushing.  This one application will leave a shiny surface.  Any bubbles
                          will soon disappear.
                      4. To take the shine down a bit, keep brushing the surface until you feel resistance. You will notice
                          the varnish will start to be less shiny. It will take a good 2-3 minutes, depending upon the
                          conditions, like humidity or air circulation in your room. Be careful that you brush down the
                          whole surface or you will have uneven shine.
                      5. Find a place for the painting to dry; my paintings with the thin, brush down coat took an hour
                          in general and the no-brush down paintings a bit longer (even a bit tacky the next day).
                      6. When finished with all the paintings, clean the brush in the solvent.
                      7. Optional: the next day, apply a second coat, thinly as before, for more shine and coverage. 
                          I found one coat to be sufficient for this group of paintings.

You can view a short video on Gamblin's website: Gamblin Artists Colors: Using Varnishes

My experience with other varnishes:

Damar varnish.  I made my own damar varnish by purchasing damar crystals (a tree resin) and dissolving them in turpentine.  It was really cool to see the bits and bugs at the jar's bottom and feeling old world.  That was for my first portrait years ago.  The instructor for that workshop had us use the same mixture, slightly diluted as a medium.  Little did I know that I was setting myself up for trouble.  Because it's mixed with turpentine, the mixture is really smelly and toxic.  I later read that old world paintings yellowed mainly because of the oil and resin varnish they used at the time.  (That's not good for white collars in the corporate portrait.)  The other major problem was that the instructor advised me to use the same mixture as a varnish.  I waited the required six months and gave it a shot.  I applied it with a brush. The texture was uneven, it set up fast leaving uneven brush strokes and too much of a shine, highlighting every bit of dust and  missed brush hairs.  Then I learned, if the varnish needs to be removed, the solvent for damar varnish would affect the damar in the paint. Lesson: do not use your medium as a varnish.  Another instructor advised me to use the workshop medium, maroger, also as a topcoat on the painting. I didn't.  (Gamvar is removable.)

Retouch Varnish. For the past few years, I was using Winsor & Newton Artists' Retouching Varnish.  It is clear and easy to apply using a similar process as above and will give a similar sheen. The advantage is that you can apply it when the painting is fresh and dry to the touch.  However, unlike Gamvar with its almost non-odor property, the retouch varnish has a major odor.  (I had to varnish in the garage, which I'm sure exposed my paintings to lots of dust.)  From what I understand, retouch varnish is really a diluted varnish.  There is standard advice that you can paint over this layer.  That's comforting when you feel like you may need to at some point.  The advice is that you should really make a decision that the painting is done.  Gamblin says when you need to 'refresh' a painting before continuing to paint, if the paint has sunken in and looks dull in the dark areas, it would be better to 'oil out', using your medium or a bit of oil to refresh these spots.  It sounds like having layers of paint with layers of retouch on top with more layers of paint and then a varnish could be problematic down the road.  In the end, since it is a diluted mixture, the retouch varnish will not be protecting your painting like a true varnish layer like Gamvar.

Why should you varnish?  First reason is to add a layer of protection against exposure to daylight, temperature differences, and traffic dust.  In my case, I just finished a portrait commission and the painting will be hanging in  a very public place with outside doors nearby.  You can read the archival and technical qualities of Gamvar and see why I chose to use it.  Second reason is that it makes the painting have the 'just painted' or wet look.  (I love walking into my studio to check on a current painting and smelling the linseed oil.)  Third reason is that the varnish will bring out or enrich the colors.  I have a collection of plein air studies done in Mexico last year and the colors appeared lifeless (see the Before painting below to compare). When I applied Gamvar, the colors popped right up and now the paintings have the original feeling of that experience (see the After painting at the beginning).  If you don't like the sheen (one artist's blog said it made his paintings look like plastic), try the 'brush down' method above.  Gamblin sells a wax for use as an alternative, non-sheen method.  I'll try that soon.

 The Before - unvarnished painting, April 2008.

When should you varnish?  If it's dry to the touch, generally within a week to a month you can apply Gamvar. The literature, like Ralph Mayer's book, The Artist's Handbook of Materials and Techniques, says to wait for 3 - 6 months (page 209). This presents a problem if you sell the painting before the recommended time frame.  Some artist have told me that they don't varnish and let the buyer worry about it.  Other artists, like me, have relied on retouch varnish to give a quick topcoat. I say, it all depends on your painting style, the type of paints, the mediums, the thin or thickness of your application.  In my case, my oil paintings are painted in thin layers over time or alla prima as in plein air. For paints, in the past, I have used earth colors, cadmiums, transparent colors, and some oily, more expensive paints. My current palette now is a limited palette of chosen paints that setup pretty fast. For mediums, I use a bit of Gamsol in the beginning and then only a bit of linseed oil later, following the 'fat over lean' suggestion.  Other varnishes and methods 'seal' the paint which promotes cracking if the underneath layers are still drying. Understanding this, the Gamblin has made Gamvar so that it can be applied sooner staying flexible with the drying process.

For Gamblin's information on varnishing, go to Gamblin Artists Colors: Varnish.

Last Saturday, I visited Michigan's Kalamazoo Institute of Arts (www.kiarts.org) to see the closing exhibit (Feb. 8, 2009) "Spared From the Storm", a collection of 89 masterworks from the New Orleans Museum of Art.  It was my first visit to the museum and I was impressed.  Free parking was across the street and the staff was helpful and pleasant.  (I was told the exhibition catalog was a dissappointment as it had artwork that didn't come to Kalamazoo.)

After watching a ten minute video by the curators (interesting details about the museum and its employees surviving the recent infamous hurricane Katrina), I went searching for one of the exhibit's highlights:  Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun's "Portrait of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France" (1788).  The curator said that Ms. Vignee-Le Brun carried the painting when she left France in order to have an example of her work.  Thinking it was small, I quickly wandered through the three rooms of the exhibit but I didn't see it.  When I went to ask a docent at the museum's lobby, I suddenly found it and I couldn't believe that I missed it when I entered the museum.  The painting with its massive, ornate frame is probably eleven feet tall!  (The actual painting's dimensions are 109.5 x 75.5 inches.)  I'll have to check my book on Vignee-Le Brun to see what it says about the painting...  From the book by Gita May Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun - The Odyssey of an Artist in an Age Of Revolution, on page 40,  a similar if not the same painting is described, "en robe de velours bleu".  The author says she's holding a book in her left-hand (the painting I saw has the book in her right-hand) but the rest of the description depicts the painting like the one in the exhibit.  (One of my major complaints of art books is that some of them do not include the dimensions of the artwork.)

After that, I wandered through the three rooms devoted to the exhibit.  The curators said one of the New Orleans Museum's mission is to collect French paintings, keeping with the flavor of its city's heritage.   The exhibit did have a good balance of French and non-French artists.  The first room had pre-Impressionist and earlier paintings.  Since I favor portraits, I zoomed in on a painting, "Portrait of Louis XIV" by Claude Lefebvre (1670).  I'm not aware of the artist, however, I am acquainted with the that era's style of meticulously rendering details. 

I move onto the next room that had the 1800's paintings and portraits.  I stayed longer in this room, to study the portraits.  There was a Franz Xaver Winterhalter - "Young Woman in a Ball Gown" (1850), which was very gracious in its large oval frame.  Excitingly, nearby was a William-Adolphe Bouguereau - "Whisperings of Love" (1889); and oh, his cool light on the warm skin technique was delightful.  On a nearby wall, was a Robert Henri - "The Blue Kimono" (1909).  I think I've read his book, The Art Spirit, more than once and now I finally see his work.  It seemed to be more about the kimono than the woman wearing it and although painterly, the colors were a bit too drab.

Next to it was my favorite of the exhibit:  John Singer Sargent's "Mrs. Asher Wertheimer" (1898).  Many of Sargent's oil portraits have a dark background, however this one was a refreshingly light.  The pearls were dabs of paint and the lace was indicated but not labored.  I got up close to see the face and noticed his technique of using warm and cool colors to model the face all the while keeping the values close.  Wonderful.  I checked my book at home about this painting.  From Richard Ormond's John Singer Sargent, Portrait of the 1890's, the portrait of Mrs. Asher Wertheimer was painted as a companion to her husband's more famous painting in celebration of their silver wedding anniversary.  Her painting feels of silver.  (Check on line for her husband's painting, Asher Wertheimer by Sargent at www.artrenewal.com.)

There were other Impressionists in the room, such as pals Sisley, Monet (a pale lavender winter scene and not quite his best house/landscape painting), and Pissaro (a most delicious sunset painting).  The Impressionist Manet came to New Orleans to visit relatives and painted one painting, which was on exhibit.  Again, another large, dark painting and seemingly unfinished out towards the edges; however, his subject, a relative going blind was painted so astutely but delicately.  I could only glance at the sculptures in the exhibit, such as a large Rodin's standing nude man because my allotted excursion time was quickly running out.

The last room had the Post-Impressionists up to modern times.  I recognized many from my painting trip to southern France a few years ago.  (While there, I visited the artist museums of Picasso, Leger, Miro, and Matisse and it was good to see these masters in the exhibit.)  Rounding it out, there were examples of Pollock and Stella among other abstract and modern artists.  Judging from the exhibit, the New Orleans Museum of Art has an excellant representation of masterworks. 

I quickly explored the permanent collection downstairs and the two gift shops (one for the exhibit).  Overall a good museum and one to return to with more time to devote to savoring good art.