Thursday, October 2, 2008

Equipment

by COROT : Oak Trees at Bas-Breau
oil on paper laid on wood
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Artists who are not familiar with plein air equipment, like those I meet at the Society of Illustrators who work exclusively in their studios, often ask me what I use in the field. I use a pochade box on a photography tripod not an easel . Charles Parker in his "lines and colors" blog entry for 8/17/08 has the most comprehensive photo essay that I have ever seen on various pochade boxes with a comparison and analysis. Therefore I'm not showing a photo of mine. I highly recommend visiting before trying to buy one. (click on purple link above. E.g. "lines and color".)

A "pochade" is French Academy terminology for an outdoor color study. The one above by Corot of a tree is in the Metropolitan Museum next to a large studio painting in which the tree figures prominently. " This study was done on paper on location possibly using a pochade box but it's rather large. On the back of it is the following: "This study by my master Corot painted about 1830 which he used for his painting of Hagar in the desert was given by him to Celestin Nanteil in 1835. I rediscovered it in very bad condition in 1884, cleaned it and had it put on panel . . . Francais."

By the way, Corot often painted outside and sold pretty much all of his work. The story is that he would sign other painter's work that he met outside if he liked the painting. That way they could sell it as a Corot. I think I've seen some of these!

"Pochade", a French linquist friend of mine, says is ultimately derived from the root for "tile" which suggests it refers to the posterizing techniques use in these studies done in the field.

These French pochades were for the most part discarded as you can see from the above description of the fate of the one in the Met. As a result, unsigned pochades by many different artists sometimes appeared in the Paris flee market up to the 1970's for very little money. If you had a good eye, you could pick up bargains. However, with the exploration of the American West, field studies became popular and were exhibited and marketed, so here in the US we never found them in antique stores as far as I know, and that interest in studies influenced the French market as well.


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