The Valley of the Trees
The Valley of the Trees was painted in the Pointillism style. Pointillism is a painting technique in which small, distinct dots of color are applied right next to each other, in patterns to form an image. Georges Seurat and Paul Signac developed the technique in 1886.
As it is always the case the close-up image shows best the amount of brushwork that has gone into this work to create a dappled light effect that bounces and filters through the trees.
Detail of Valley of the Trees
There are many ways to paint an image, but with pointillism the idea is to look at areas of light against dark and to paint exactly the color that first comes to mind. As the lighting changes throughout the day, these color dabs will of course change as well. However as an artist, I take the liberty to play around with what I think works best. Here deep purples , oranges and yellows are interrupted by dabs of green.
Valley of the Trees Detail 2
As the landscape recedes the dabs become smaller and the detail less apparent. It is as if a fog has settles lightly covering the trees. Seurat spend two years on a large scale painting to get this effect, however thanks to todays technology, I was able to complete my pointillism after one week of continues work. I found this great video on Youtube that shoes how Seurat painted in the pointillism style, for those of you unfamiliar with his technique.
