Hensche on Painting

John W. Robichaux, Dorothy Billiu-Hensche

• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9780486317618
• Topic: Art
• Subtopic: Techniques d'art

An artist for over 70 years and a teacher for more than 60, painter Henry Hensche (1901–92) employed Monet’s Impressionist tradition of seeing and painting color under the influence of light, and he taught his students to `see the light, not the object.` In this book, his student and biographer John Robichaux examines the artist’s basic painting philosophy and methodology, as expounded in his famous classes and workshops on Cape Cod.
A prolific artist and inspiring teacher, Hensche touched countless lives as he challenged pupils to understand how they could make their paintings better by having a particular vision of color — whether in a still life, landscape, or figure painting. One of his many students, Robert Longley, claims that Hensche `showed us that there was no shortcut to great art. His specific teachings on color and light are useful tools in the creation of art, but of greatest importance was Henry's relentless quest for beauty.`
Brimming with practical advice for amateurs and professionals alike, Hensche on Painting is intended to help further develop artists' own visual sense of nature.

Hensche on the Landscape

When man first painted recognizable forms, the landscape form was simply the background against which figures were displayed. The backgrounds were like stilted stage settings for the action of human drama. During the Renaissance the compositional components were given equal emphasis and figures became part of the landscape rather than players before it. By the time of Corot, the figures were dominated by the landscape. This all follows the parallel developments of the philosophical thoughts of the Greeks and Western Christians.

Henry Hensche warned repeatedly that landscape painting is probably the most difficult of all painting, although it does not appear so. Painting the landscape takes more skill than figure painting because the painter must, besides creating the form, create the illusion of greater space and atmosphere not as much demanded in the figure or the portrait. Space and atmosphere are indeed present in the near proximity of the figure or the portrait; variety, however, is essentially reduced. The irregular forms of nature, complex color notes, and the difficulty of discerning where light and shadow fall in a highly textured atmosphere make the landscape master over the painter.

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Landscape painting, when you think of it, is probably the most difficult painting. A figure or head brings to mind all the knowledge of form from ancient times to the present. Form was the most important area to master and endless hours and years were devoted to its study. Any student who wanted to be an artist was put in cast class and learned to render the figure with proportional truth.

Parallel to the drawing of the figure from cast, anatomical knowledge was introduced to the art student. With all its complicated interlocking forms. And then they had to learn how they all functioned within the body. From this, the student graduated to the life class to learn the model in colors, in a value scheme, which was, more or less, a formula. The figure could be modeled in oil color and given the effect of light. All this took some time and was a formidable problem. When it was accomplished it was considered a great triumph and rightly so.

When pictures were first painted, figures were the dominant part and landscape forms were simply background against which the figures were displayed expressing human ideas. The background was like a theater curtain or setting for the action and ideas of humanity. You can think of Sasseta’s works, the 15th-century Italian painter who painted Man, Jesus, and Joseph. There you will see the use of the landscape in its final stages. The forms are flat and simple, and expressed with their local color, as Renaissance painters could do, and would continue to do. It was the figure that was rounded, as it was of primary importance. But as time went on, the landscape background became of greater importance.

A skill was developed to make the forms more complete. Often the figures were diminished, and the landscape took up most of the painting, until finally, like Corot, the figures were merely incidental and the landscape forms became dominant. The idea was that man was the most important thing on earth, on every part of the globe.

In another part of the globe, the Buddhist religion taught that man was only a small part of the scheme of things, and they considered man as a minor subject, expressing man’s relationship to the vast landscape forms around them. And the figures expressed their ideas through gestures.

It was the Eastern artists who concerned themselves with the landscape. They saw the atmospheric effects of nature that created the moods of man, their psychological side. As civilization progressed, they stayed in that art form until the opening of the new ideas of the Western world entered their society. While some Italian painters taught linear perspective, revolutionizing their visual experience, the “Old Masters” of Japan saw these Western ideas as a revolt of the young. This was comparable to the revolt of the Impressionists against the tonal painting of the day.

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A painting teacher asked his students to paint morning landscapes and change canvases every two hours. This is is a hopeless assignment to develop the crude vision of beginners. His aim was correct, but the method was wrong. Its not the length of time of study that counts—the quality does. To develop a finer perception of color, you must teach descriptive color.

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Always turn your study of the landscape into studied large masses until you’ve achieved the light key. This would be very few notes. Make them angular and then make the first divisions of color in each mass into a series of squares, rectangles, and triangles. This allows for easier study of colors as opposed to working the drawing too soon. If you don’t do a study this way, you will sacrifice the color for the drawing.

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Place a simple building in the scene. Treat it as just a block study with landscape around it.

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Reduce the panorama of the landscape. We have a tendency to make trees too large. They will grow in your paintings anyway. Smaller trees will make your study of the larger color masses more effective.

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In the beginning, you shouldn’t try to paint a landscape that is completely lit in sunlight with almost no shade or shadow masses. This is too difficult for the student. Find a landscape with definite breaks between shadow and light.

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All the young sculptors of Helenistic Greece saw the forms of the human body had rhythmic relationships that the archaic period sculptors did not perceive. So the forms became more real. The young men who discovered this, created the glory of Greek sculpture, like Praxiteles and others. They set the standard, which has not been surpassed.

The high point of the figure in Greece is equal to the discoveries of the Impressionists. The Impressionists reached similar perfection two thousand years later in the painting language.

Eastern civilizations did not make such progress, but they did give the first inkling of the importance of landscape and man’s relation to it. The development of man’s consciousness of what he was looking at, from using only the simple colors available to primitive minds, was the beginning. Gradually the forms were rendered more accurately, and the development of landscape forms was introduced, including leaves and flowers.

The more alert painting minds began to see the atmospheric effects. And they achieved this by varying the value of colors and created the illusion of distance. Parallel to this discovery, linear perspective was discovered. Now the landscapes were more real, or created that impression. If you look at this period of landscape painting, you will notice the first notation of great distance. In da Vinci’s Mona Lisa you should notice the foreground to the middle distance—the distance is created by variations of earth colors. He saw more variations. And so, the modeling of landscape forms equaled the modeling of the figure. There was a consistency that others lacked.

When you look beyond the middle distance, however, da Vinci indicated the far distance with blues and greens. It was the first step in the growth of mans consciousness of noting great distances, and the objects seen in them were bluish and cold. From this first glimpse of understanding distance came the idea so often quoted, “that all you need to create distance is blue.” It is not that simple. Though it may be and is generally a fact.

Another generality is the often-quoted, “All you need to know is that light planes are warm and shadow planes are cold.” And after that, the student of art can flounder on and invent his own nebulous and confused vision.

Landscape finally became an independent art and, as it developed, it affected figure painting indoors and out. Figure painting, when it is understood, has been affected by landscape painting. Man became as involved in getting the forms in the landscape as he did in the figure, rendering them solidly and in detail. Gradually it was the landscape that brought the consciousness of atmosphere into the figure. So even figure painting had distances indicated through value and tonal gradations.

So figure and landscape painting affected each other. In landscape painting, first form was rendered, gradually by means of value variations of the same color. Usually the local color. This is seen nicely in Inness, Turner, and the figures of Rembrandt and Velazquez. Turner, however, at the end of his life, added another dimension. He created the understanding of the “light key” and my notion is, if he had had the colors at his disposal, he would have achieved earlier what Monet eventually did a generation later.

Landscape became an art form independent of figure painting and equal to it. Van Dyck classifies paintings from the Greek point of view. He considered man the most important creation. Therefore, Raphael’s School of Athens made up of Greek scholars was more important to him than Chardin’s little still lifes, yet many believe that the Chardins have finer tonality than Raphael’s or Ingres’ works. For instance, after figure painting with people as subjects, he considered the portrait important. Then landscape, then, finally, the lowly still life. No matter how poorly it was painted or composed, he thought the subject should be considered first in artistic value. John Ruskin had the same point of view and the lectures of Reynolds indicate the same trend of mind. So we ask ourselves, “What is the subject we like and want to paint?” In this case we have made up our mind that it is the landscape and need not apologize.

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When you come down to it, landscape painting really takes more skill than figure painting, excepting anatomical knowledge. The landscape painter has to draw well, he has to know the character of forms, and it has to be modeled like the body. You have to compose as in figure painting, and so on. However, from my point of view, the creation of objects and the illusion of space is just as demanding as form knowledge of the figure. Despite its complicated and varied forms, a figure is easily seen in volume. Usually painted in distance, you can see the color mass of a torso easily enough. But, take a bunch of shrubbery, you find it is difficult to figure out where one form begins and another ends. Your mind has to perceive it like the hair on the head. Unless you understand the human skull, you cannot understand the masses of hair. Yet, landscape forms are basic and harder to find, where one begins and intertwines with another. All sorts of minor forms interfere.

And so the selection process of what form to pick first expresses the main mass, and then the minor forms that are related to the largest are more difficult. Most beginners realize this as they start. In a still life it is comparatively easy, and also in a human figure. In landscape, too, you have to know how one form flows into another, like the figure, to create the illusion of life. One must also learn proportional accuracy. You compose in-depth, as in the figure, and then you must add color key or atmospheric effect. This is the poetry of all painting. If you are interested in form—be a sculptor! Creation of form in the flat surface is not enough. It can be done in black and white easier because color is not needed.

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Landscape painting, as Monet made obvious, is an idea that affected all painting. With it he proved how the main actor in the drama of painting is the light key. And, the light key varies from morning to night and varies as to the kind of weather, and distance, and season, and probably according to the temperature zone you live in, as well as in the combinations of atmospheres. Monet discovered this while painting the coal-smogged air of London.

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We have learned that landscape painting revolutionized figure painting. But figure painting must obey the laws of vision as well. The figure painter must also indicate the color key of nature if he wants to create the color harmony. If this is not obeyed or understood, you will make forms by creating your own color scheme.

The difference between modern color, or realistic color, isn’t much, except the modernist doesn’t obey the light scheme. But neither do most landscape painters. They create realistic forms but do not observe the laws of color and light. The decorative color scheme is a matter of what is called “taste” and need not copy reality. But if a realist doesn’t obey nature’s physical laws, he confuses the problem. In their ignorance, they defended their creative notions, in other words, they abandoned any laws that express truth. These Modernists should have listened to Einstein. Einstein said that God did not play dice with the universe. The great universe must have laws with its functions, and so does the art of painting if it wants...