David Sharpe
Beautiful, Serene, and Full of Wonder: The Paintings of David Sharpe
David Sharpe is the sole Canadian member of the American Tonalist Society, and his landscapes wade heavily into tonalist territory. Yet in practice Sharpe moves fluidly between tonalism, his own brand of impressionism and expressive non-representational abstraction. He describes his influences as “American, British, and Russian Impressionist Painters, with a special affinity for the American Tonalists of the 20th Century.” He’s a founding member of the Ontario Plein Air Society. He also leads “Painting the Emotional Landscape,” a popular painting workshop in which he teaches students to “to emote in their work…. to try and paint what they ‘feel’ about what they see -- not just paint what they see,” he says. “I attempt to teach them about how to convey mood, atmosphere, and an atmospheric ‘sense of place.’”
An Honors graduate in illustration from the Alberta College of Art and Design, David’s taught drawing and design at Ontario College of Art and Design University (OCADU), Concordia University, and Capilano College in Vancouver. He has lectured extensively at Queens University, St Lawrence College, and Humber College, where he’s sat on the College’s Advisory Board.
David’s home and primary studio are in Stratford, SW Ontario just west of Toronto, and he maintains a second studio in the Alberta foothills near the ranching town of Cochrane, Alberta. His work is represented by Village Studios in Stratford (Ontario, Canada) and Mountain Galleries in the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel, The Jasper Park Lodge, and Chateau Whistler.
David is active on Instagram and Facebook and can be booked to teach from the “workshops” page of his website, www.sharpegallery.com.
Lightning Strike - This was my attempt to catch the brilliance of a single line of light against dark.
Tonalism.com: Do you call or think of yourself as a tonalist? How or why / why not?
David Sharpe: I guess I don’t really see myself as a strict tonalist in the sense that that’s the only way I paint. The mood and atmosphere of tonal paintings I’m naturally drawn to because, like the original Tonalists, I love the nuances of the low light of dawn and evening. I also love to paint other times of the day using the day's particular cast of light and shadow. But I must admit I’m drawn to the quiet times of day and to the artistic emotional inspiration that comes from seeing and feeling and trying to paint that.
My definition of Tonalism is a work that has a quiet, almost contemplative feel to it. It’s basically keeping all your values all in a lower range where your highlights might be a 5. But nothing screams out at you. And using a limited palette will always keep your colours harmonious.
Edge of Light - The Alberta foothills clearing after a rain always provides dramatic slices of light. I liked the design of the diagonals of light and land.
Tonalism.com: What’s been the story of your journey as an artist?
David Sharpe: Well, my mom was a good amateur painter and I always drew as a kid. During a one month stay after a serious operation in hospital in Edmonton when I was 10, my folks brought me piles of paper and pencils and I drew and drew -- mostly from comic books of that era spread all over my hospital bed.
I graduated from high school in Calgary. Pretty straight trajectory from there because Calgary had a great art school. In the mid ‘60s The Alberta College of Art had a solid reputation for turning out grads who could actually paint and draw and, most importantly, get jobs if they were in the commercial stream. I really didn’t consider fine art painting as an art career then. I took art history and knew all the great names in Fine Art, but it was the era of the great magazine illustrators, and guys like Bernie Fuchs, Bob Peak, Mark English, Fred Oatnes, Robert Heindel were producing graphically powerful story telling art. That’s what I wanted to do.
Remember, it was the era of the magazine. These guys were like gods to me. I should add that there were great Canadian influences too ... guys like Will Davies, Tom McNeely, and Ken Dallison.
So, in my second year I majored in illustration. I was pretty good at drawing the figure and fashion illustration intrigued me. I started collecting tear sheets of all the great fashion illustrators and building my portfolio. Worked my buns off that year but managed to graduate with honors and first in my class.
I was very fortunate because a large art studio In Edmonton somehow saw my work and started feeding me client fashion drawing assignments in my fourth year, which I was able to use as credit for school. And that same studio hired me the day after graduation and put me to work illustrating everything from oil field drilling bits to race cars to slick menu covers. I can still remember my first day thinking I couldn’t believe I was getting paid to do this!
After a while I could see the illustration business going south as the magazines’ power waned and the massive influence of TV was on the rise. So I switched from illustrating someone else’s idea to the guy that comes up with the ideas, and I went into ad agency art direction. Turned out I was pretty good at it, and I spent the next 40 years in the industry in Montreal, Vancouver, and then finally Toronto doing campaigns for Lexus, American Airlines, Apple, BC Tourism, Air Canada, Ontario Tourism, GM etc., etc.
I did virtually no serious easel painting during that time, just a few family portraits.
Winter Sunset - i like to push reality into the abstract realm at times. This is simply the forms and colours of an Alberta stream in Winter done almost entirely with a palette knife and edge of a credit card.
When I hit 50, I knew advertising was a young person’s game -- the pressure, the deadlines, the clients, the politics, the long hours. So, I started looking around for a second career to move into when I retired. I’m not handy and I don’t play golf or sail. But I knew I absolutely loved the act of creating images...making something out of nothing.
Then one day a guy in the fly-fishing club I belonged to at the time asked if I’d paint a fly-fishing picture for him. So I started to look at the fly-fishing art masters of the time --Homer, Russell Chatham, Thomas Aquinas Daly, and John Swan specifically, and I was totally blown away by their wonderful depictions of the natural beauty, grace, and lyricism of the sport. (In art college I had always fly-fished and hiked the rivers of the foothills West of Calgary).
Their wonderfully quiet art spoke to me in a profound way. So, I ended up doing more outdoor works and was fortunate to get my work into Toronto’s new Orvis Store, where it sold well.
Then one day, looking in a remainder book bin, I came across a little book on the work and methods of Trevor Chamberlain, a wonderfully evocative tonal painter in England.
I saw it was mostly done plein air and after that I was hooked. The fly fisherman was gone from my work.
Trevor was influenced greatly by England’s Edward Seago, whom I consider to be the John Constable of the 20th Century. Seago’s elegant, effortless, beautifully drawn and composed works in oil and watercolor, with their subtle moods and atmospheres, drew me to him. Still does. When I want to get my motor going he’s the one with the key. Always.
I would religiously buy The American Art Review magazine. It contained a ton on the early and late American Impressionists - Innes, Twachtman, Whistler, Ranger, and the whole Tonalist movement in America. I lapped it all up. Looked at nothing else. Put together scrapbooks for each painter.
So I went out and bought a boat-anchor French easel and started my own plein air journey, painting in Toronto’s parks and ravines and countryside every weekend when I could.
I started painting in our sunroom but soon outgrew it. So I gutted an old single-car garage out behind our home, opened it to the roof, put in a new floor, two huge skylights, some baseboard heat, painted it all white and went to work every night and weekend that I wasn’t at the agency. I did this for pretty much three years and threw most of my work away, learning what real painting was all about.
Night Patterns - I saw this out a car window one night. Just the mass of design shapes of the evergreens melding and merging in the moonlight without much detail. Again, for me it’s all about design. And in this piece the colour of night.
Now I was incredibly lucky to have had my illustration chops to fall back on, so it was relatively easy for me. I knew how to draw which is fundamental to being a good painter.
I just had to dust those executional skills off. And I had to get “gallery good,” which I was determined to do.
Next came a couple of small very good Toronto galleries that gave me good experience in assembling a body of work, hanging, dealing with dealers, dealing with buyers etc.
But I was still basically painting outside on my own, so I and a few other lone painters banded together and founded the Ontario Plein Air Society, which gathered steam and members as we had well organized outings and then member shows which did well. Had a lot of fun. It’s still vibrant although I’m not involved much anymore.
When it was time to retire, I had a good start on a new career as a painter. My business background gave me a solid footing on the boring but necessary things like time management, deadlines, client contact and graphic promotion design which is key today and so easy with services like Vistaprint.
So, in 2011 we cashed out of Toronto and bought a lovely townhome in Stratford, a vibrant arts and farming town of 30,000 two hours southwest of Toronto where my gallery Village Studios handles my work. It’s very flat in Perth County but there are wonderful skies, which you’ll see a lot in my work.
I’m also fortunate to have my work in the beautiful Mountain Galleries in the majestic Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel in Banff Alberta, the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge and the Fairmont Chateau Whistler in Whistler BC.
Last year I was invited to be the only Canadian signature member of the American Tonalist Society and had three works accepted into their first annual show in 2019 at the historic Salmagundi Club in NYC. To hang beside amazing artists I’d always admired like Douglas Fryer, Marc Hanson, Don Demers, John MacDonald, Charlie Hunter, and Dennis Sheehan to name just a few was an honor and a humbling experience I will never forget.
Oddly I also do a 180 on representational tonalism with my pure abstract work, which I find to be a needed diversion as it feeds my pure design side. Go figure.
Clearing Over Bells Barn - This is a lovely 200 year old barn near me that I paint a lot. Remember: bad weather equals good pictures. I like to go out just before or after a rain when the sky’s are dramatic looking for simple compositions that stress the sky.The barn wasn’t the focus really...just a sort of ground anchor for the sky above.
Tonalism.com: What are the main objectives of your current approach?
David Sharpe: They’re pretty simple really. I want viewers and buyers of my work to feel the emotion I had when I painted the piece. I don’t go out to necessarily record what’s in front of my easel. I go out to make a good picture. Sometimes it’s all there but most times not. With my main consideration being to capture the emotional richness of the scene I'm seeing, if I feel it's necessary to get to that emotional state, I’ll consider changing things if changing something will do that: moving the horizon line, reworking a form, an intensity, or a color. I invent. I love to explore. I’ll try anything. I love to surprise myself. I have a number of techniques I use depending on what I’m feeling about what I’m painting. Loose, brushy, heavy impasto, straight line, monotone, whatever. Currently I’m moving in an area of half representation and half abstraction done with a knife. Some pieces are just large graphic landforms stitched together by light and, always I hope, a strong simple design.
Tonalism.com: What was the actual process or series of events that led you to paint as you do now?
David Sharpe: I honestly believe my many years as a graphic designer have given me the imperative that the design of a composition comes first. If it looks even vaguely like a hundred other landscape paintings out there, I’m not happy. I look for unexpected elegant compositions and color choices, offbeat but hopefully emotive. I scrape, I scratch back, I rub out… whatever it takes to make the marks and the image that expresses that emotion. I’m always looking for an edge -- something unexpected. Those three years locked in my garage studio taught me that you need to put in the brush mileage. There’s always another painting.
Light to the West - Another ridge light piece from the Alberta foothills. There were a lot more trees on the ridge but as I say ‘less is more’ and the use of just a few trees I think throws the eye onto the light wedge against the dark foreground.
Tonalism.com: Please describe a little bit of your painting process(es) not neglecting technical details (for example, do you use a subtractive method? What is your go-to color palette? Do you stain your canvases first, and if so, what pigment(s) do you use? Are you an intuitive painter or do you begin with a careful sketch?).
The beginnings of a concept.
David Sharpe: I usually start on a birch or canvas panel, gessoed, and at times I’ll brush on a 50/50 mixture of gesso and acrylic texture paste. Look closely at Seago’s pictures and you’ll see the whorls and ridges. If they’re too prominent, I’ll either sand them down and/ or add more coats of gesso. Sometimes I like the natural birch wood color that I’ll coat with shellac or GAC 200. Big birch panels are cradled.
I use a limited palette of a warm and cool of each primary plus white as John Carlson did. I use Gamblin Safflower oil gel as a solvent and mix Winsor & Newton Liquin into my colors to speed dry times. I rarely glaze but want to get better at it as the Tonalists used glazes to get the soft atmospheric effects they did. But it seems to elude me for some reason. I sometimes tone a board with burnt sienna or yellow ochre or Ultramarine blue. And sometimes red or orange. I always use cheap acrylics for this.
I work sitting down with a large glass table to my left that I put my colors out on. Those colors are, going clockwise from top left: Titanium White, Cadmium Yellow Light, Cadmium orange, Cadmium Red Light, Alizarin Crimson, Viridian, Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna and Yellow Ochre.
I’m not anal. I’ll lightly sketch in my design shapes using a thin semi dark then when it’s dry, I’ll loosely block in my color masses. Then I bear down with whatever it takes to get my emotion down. And if I like it I leave it. If there are passages around the one I like that suck, I either scrape them off or rework them until I like them.
Cold Night Coming - Winter sunset on the Alberta prairie where I grew up can be bone chilling cold at 30 below with no wind. But the air will be crystal clear throwing a cold colour everywhere in the sky and the ground. I’m partial to high or in this case low horizon lines as they can be a strong composition device to anchor your painting. I use them a lot.
Inspiration for me can come from anywhere. I’m always looking: framing, storing in my mind’s eye. Even a quick glance out a car window at sundown will give me a painting, or a passing rainstorm seen from my deck. Maybe I’ll just use pieces of it. Other times I’ll set up my Open Box 11x14 plein air kit and paint the scene. Sometimes I’ll even start with an evocative title I like and no painting for it then go looking for a subject. (My piece ’When the Dark Comes Early’ is an example of this.) Sometimes I’ll even start with just 3-5 colors I like that I feel are harmonious and start from there.In terms of composition, I aim to keep an idea simple I find relatively easy: I’m ruthless with detail. If in doubt leave it out is a sign on my easel. Many painters just put too many fence posts, too many trees, too many cars etc. Try eliminating half of them. My guess is you’ll like your composition better. This is where taking a shot of the busy piece into the app Procreate comes into its own for me. Using an Apple Pencil I‘ll simply start to visually edit...eliminating subject matter until I see something I like on my iPad screen. Then I’ll make change in paint on my painting. Let me say here that my editing process is totally Intuitive. I edit until I see something I like. Then leave it.
Finish? I like the evenness of satin or gloss spray varnish-I rarely use flat. I like Traditional frames by Omega. And flat float frames on white or black.
Woman Seated at a Window - Edward Degas
Tonalism.com: Could you name any specific influences on your work? Are there any artists you look to, exhibitions or even a particular painting, historical or contemporary, or books that have greatly influenced you? Are there any artists or books, creative practices or anything else that you’d recommend for the aspiring tonalist?
David Sharpe: Oh wow.
Paintings?
So many, but the one I saw many years ago and still have pinned to my easel is Woman Seated at a Window by Edward Degas. It says nothing yet says everything. Reminds me every day of just how much you DON’T have to put in a painting.
Books?
Robert Henri’ classic The Art Spirit, Charles W. Hawthorn on Painting, and Kevin Macpherson and his books were and still are a big influence. All of Edward Seago’s books for sure, Like Breath on Glass: Whistler, Inness, and the Art of Painting Softly is a stunning examination of how they achieved the veils they did. John Fabian Carlson’s classic Landscape Painting is my and every painter’s bible that I still use.
Landscape Painting by Sir Alfred East (Seago was his student) is wonderfully poetic and Oil Painting Techniques and Materials by Harold Speed, published in 1924 is a rock-solid goldmine of information.
I’m currently reading A Painting Place- The Life and Work of David B Milne by David Silcox. Milne was a contemporary of Canada’s Group of Seven, but very different in his execution. And De Kooning - An American Master by Mark Stevens and Analyn Swan is an engaging, readable profile of the man and the whole Abstract Expressionist scene in New York in the ‘50s. I’m also reading Walter Sickert - A Life by Matthew Sturgis.
David Adams Cleveland’s huge ‘A History of American Tonalism’ is THE new definitive book on the Tonalist movement and not to be missed. Could be the only book you need. The letters of NC Wyeth compiled by Betsy Wyeth is always on my night table as is ‘A Canvas To Cover’ by Edward Seago.
Historical Painter Influences?
Constable, Sargent ( of course) Sorolla, Levitan, Tom Thomson, NC Wyeth, Andrew Wyeth, John Twachtman, Henry Ward Ranger, Charles Warren Eaton, Whistler, Sam Hyde Harris, Richard Diebenkorn, Franz Kline, Robert Motherwell, Robert Rauschenberg, Arthur Streeton, Walter Sickert, Dwight Tryon, Birge Harrison, William John Leech, Sir John Arnesby Brown(he taught Seago), Bernie Fuchs, Robert Heindel and countless others.
Living Painter Influences
Aside from the ones above, there’s Russell Chatham,(recently passed on)Marc Hanson, Curt Hanson (sadly, gone), Bill Wray, Eleinne Basa, Don Demers, Len Chemiel, Mark Daniel Nelson, Kim Lordier, Stuart Shils, Scott Conary, Michael Lynch, Anna Wainright, Kim English, Nancy Bush, John Felsing Jr., Eric Aho, Fred Cuming, T Allan Lawson, and many many more.
Fog Rolling In - This was done from memory from many years ago from a trip to the Maine Coast- Inland from the rocks where the dunes drift in and out of the fog. I wasn’t interested in detail. Just the big shapes. And the fog isn’t everywhere like you’d expect. Just the very back. Hence the title. Less is more.
Tonalism.com: Any advice for the aspiring tonalist?
David Sharpe: First off let me say these are my opinions only. They work for me but may not work for you:
1. Tone down your palette. Try using burnt Sienna for your red, yellow ochre for your yellow and Ultramarine. Chroma can be a killer of tonal work. I use a touch of burnt sienna or yellow ochre to take the edge off some of my mixes.
2. Mix your greens. You’ll control the strength more. Green out of a tube can be deadly.
3. Look for quiet compositions. Don’t over complicate the scene. Less is usually more.
4. Read voraciously about the methods, materials and works of painters you admire. Try painting a copy of a piece that you like.
5. Take a workshop with a Tonalist painter you admire.
6. Don’t get locked into a piece that’s tanking. Start over or toss it. You grow by being very very self-critical.
7. Look hard and long at other painters you admire. Don’t see some of their qualities in your work? There’s your problem.
8. Audit your drawing skills. If you can’t draw well you’ll never paint well representationally. There are no shortcuts here. Take a weekly life class.
9. Keep an open mind and eye. Try anything. Try everything. Surprise Yourself.
After The Rains - Again another plein air piece done quickly after a Perth County rain one afternoon and the gold tones that emerged out of it as it cleared up. It’s all about the design of the cloud forms-something that always captivates me. I can usually find a painting up there.
Tonalism.com: What is art’s purpose in the world? And/or is there anything I didn’t ask that you want people to know about your work and/or your personal practice?
David Sharpe: To me the purpose of art in the world is to convey emotion. Love it or hate it, but it should ring an emotional bell in the viewer. Full stop.
I believe a painting shouldn’t have to shout to be heard. It should have an ‘elegance 'of design and subject matter if that makes any sense. I try to leave something for the viewer’s imagination- not give it all away. Hold some mystery in it.
A collector once said to me “David your work is more poetic than picturesque.” And I’m totally fine with that. I believe it’s not what you put in a piece, it’s what you leave out. But the last word goes to jazz giant Miles Davis who said, “Don’t play what’s there. Play what’s NOT there.”
Snowfields - This was done to try and get down the spiky design of the willows under the snow. There were a lot more in the snow but as I say, good composition isn’t about what you put in-it’s what you leave out. Try to get your idea across with as little as possible.
Tonalism.com: Where do you see Tonalism going?
David Sharpe: Well, given the huge response last year to the newly formed American Tonalist Society’s Inaugural show at the historic Salmagundi Club in NYC in 2019 I’d say the future is bright indeed as more and more painters and collectors become more aware of its rich history.
Daniel Ambrose, Eleinne Basa, Mary Erickson, and Don Demers deserve a huge hand for their extraordinary vision and effort in forming the American Tonalist Society group of member painters and with then Chairman Tim Newton’s help putting a contemporary face to Tonalism.
The whole genre of a more quiet, contemplative, yes spiritual if you will, type of painting is something I believe the world needs now more than ever.
We live in a mind-numbing whirl of wealth, poverty, noise, stress, striving and lack of human concern for others, to the point where we begin to question the future for our kids and grandkids. Art has always had the ability to lift one up. Beauty knows no bounds. And with so much that’s wrong with the world now, quiet tonal paintings I think are a welcome reminder that the world still is beautiful, serene, and full of wonder.