Tree School - Freely Working from Photos

Olive Trees & Paint
May 2008
Pigment Wash, Charcoal & Pastel
On Diane Townsend Paper
21.5" x 14"
Casey Klahn

I hope you are aware of the troubles of working from photos. They include getting permissions from the photographer, incorrect perspectives that are inherent to photos and color and value issues. A good rule of thumb is to work from photos of places that you have been, yourself. This olive tree image originates from Italy, and I have a deep connection with the landscape there. I am currently working from some photos that I took of coastal Washington State, where I had recent plein air sessions and where I grew up.


I used reductive treatments where I rubbed away the pigment in the trunks with a kneaded eraser.


All this being said, the response that you have to your photos may be a great point of departure for your masterpiece. When I began this olive tree series, I had a picture in my mind of how the master, Wolf Kahn, treated olive groves in Italy. I had a feeling for the oldness and the primary nature of these much-painted trees. I wanted my treatment to be new, but still somehow related to the classic look of olive trees. I wanted the emotion.

Olive Trees and Paint is as much about the tools I used in the painting as it is about back light and ragged branches. The Townsend sanded paper; the under wash of pigment and water; the over-sized electric green Sennelier pastel stick and gestural elements are forces that I brought to bear. Composing on-the-fly, with intuitive placement of the elements, was a focus of mine in this image. The use of black charcoal established a strong and gestural pattern to the branches and trunks. I used reductive treatments where I rubbed away the pigment in the trunks with a kneaded eraser. The triad of violet against green and reddish umber provides life to the color composition.

Remember how you freely re-arrange the elements in front of you when you are painting from nature? The same applies to using photos for reference material in composing new works.