Last week I was trying to think about what was it that made me the artist I am today? I came up with a bunch of stuff but a big part of my studying to become a better artist was to copy master's paintings. What am I talking about is I would copy the master's works of art from the many books I purchased of my favorite artists.
I copied a ton of works from the master's books that I had collected over the years. Listed below are many of the books that I would copy from. I know I have brought up a couple of these books recently because they were also the books that the school recommended. But this time I am showing some books that are not really teaching books, but more pictures of the master's paintings books.
The most copied paintings of a master's work was John Pike. I painted a load of his paintings and they taught me so much when it came to composition.
HIs Book HERE and his other
book HERE
Painted a lot of John Singer Sargent's watercolor paintings too.
HERE is my favorite of his books
This one is great to
HERE
Ogden M Pleissner had the best watercolor book ever... I almost wore that book out!
HERE
Of course, I did copy a few of my mentor Irving Shapiro but I would never show him.
HERE
Then of course there was the Wyeth family and I would copy from every one of them, including Jamie.
Andrew HERE Jamie HERE NC HERE
Then there were the master painters of today and those you can find on the internet at their websites.
One thing I need to tell my students is that you can copy the paintings and even sell them but you better give those masters the credit and put the words "After Wyeth" by your signature if you do a painting that is a copy. You have to credit the artist.
I never sold those paintings because I used them for learning purposes. I did however give a bunch of them away.
