1st Question: As a complete tyro, who loves pictures, is it worth while for me to try to start painting, irre­spective of age?

Answer: The answer is an immediate "Yes." It is cer­tainly very much worth while, from many points of view. The gift of being able to express oneself in terms of line and color is never completely lacking, but only dormant and overlaid by interest in other things that develop as life goes on. All that is really necessary is the strong wish or desire to paint and draw. It may come at any time or age in one's life. A certain amount of regular practice is all that is required, plus the sus­tained wish to proceed. It is a question of seeing life in terms of the medium of expression: of seeing lines, masses, pattern, shape in things as you look at them. Once this habit of really seeing things is formed you will quickly learn to express the things you see. Actu­ally the means of expression, the technique, is not a difficult thing in its elementary terms. It may sound difficult when expressed in words, or seem difficult when one is looking at world masterpieces of art, but it really remains within the scope of all who have the interest to pursue it. And the benefits derived from finding this creative means of expression are tremen­dous. It gives an added interest to every walk you take, to every ride in bus or train, to every visit to a strange place. The power to see things with your own individ­ual viewpoint is the awakening of a new world for you, which has hitherto been overlaid by reading books and looking at films, and sports, where other artists are pro­viding the spectacle. The creation of a work of art, however simple and unsophisticated, is a help to your individual personality, it gives a new sense of self-con­fidence, a fresh realization of your own power.

2nd Question: What medium do you consider is the best to start using, in the search for self-expression through art?

Answer: The answer to this question is rather compli­cated. Sketching with a pencil or chalk is the simplest way to begin, but it is tentative and not very satisfy­ing, although one should keep a notebook or sketch book handy at all times. Water colors are usually the first to be used in schools, because of their cheapness and apparent easiness of handling. But, as a matter of sober fact, water colors are not an easy medium to use, and their difficulties often put the student or beginner off further efforts. I would suggest that oil colors should be tackled right away, although this is not the order in which they appear in this book. Drawing and paint­ing should never be separated; they are one and the same—every brush stroke should "draw" as well as lay on color. Every stroke should take a pronounced and definite shape with a beginning and an end. In using oil colors you are using the medium that can give the utmost effect that painting can give, for it has all the depth and tone and color necessary. Once you begin to understand its quality as a substance and get famil­iar with the colors, you will find it the most satisfying of all the media to use.

3rd Question: Is the more modern outlook on paint­ing a reasonable one?

Answer: Yes, definitely. All this talk about the deca­dence of modern art is absurd. There are all sorts of experiments and trials and errors—the young artists dis­like the older men, and why not? On the shoulders of the fathers the sons climb, but they have to believe that their fathers are utterly wrong. The new genera­tion of artists cannot worship only at the shrine of the past—if they did it would be the end of advancement. Modern art is as healthy as at any time in the history of art and it has given something invaluable to anyone starting out to paint: it has given a free road to do as you please—obeying the code of the road, but with free­dom to explore, and to develop and imagine what you will. There has never been a time when rules and reg­ulations meant less and when anyone who has an idea and the guts to express it receives more sympathy. It is a great age for the artists. Painting is not the pre­rogative of a trade union or a profession, it is a form of expression which all can use to their own good.

4th Question: It is often said that it takes a lifetime to learn to paint. Is it, therefore, possible to find any de­gree of expression, as a painter, if one can only give up a few hours a week to practicing the art?

Answer: This is almost the same question as the first. The difference seems to lie only in the time factor. Of course it takes more than a lifetime to learn all there is to know about painting, in fact it would take a thou­sand lifetimes and then the whole art would only be in its infancy! So we can leave out the time element. It is quite possible and not at all difficult to find a very adequate means of expression in painting, if one can only give up, say, a few hours at each week-end to painting. I should say that a regular average of five hours a week would be more than adequate to develop and expand anyone's innate gifts.

5th Question: How soon after starting to paint, as a hobby, can one expect to attain a certain degree of abil­ity in expressing the view one has of life?

Answer: The answer to this question naturally de­pends upon the amount of time and energy one expends. But it would not take more than two months, with an average of five hours per week, to achieve quite a degree of ability in expressing one's vision of things seen. It does not do to have too much idea about advancement and achievement. Let these things develop gradually and do not be in any hurry or become overambitious about results. After all, every expression is an experience and is helping in very many ways to benefit the whole per­sonality.

6th Question: What is the essential outlook which it is necessary to acquire in order to become creative in terms of drawing and painting?

Answer: In addition to becoming able to see things, instead of only casually looking at them, one must de­velop the impersonal attitude. That is, the power to drop all associations that normally crop up and instead to consider the things one sees with complete detach­ment. Instead of seeing the cup of tea as a beverage to drink one has to see the shape of the cup against the saucer, the color of the tea, the stains on the saucer, the relationship of the spoon to the cup and the sau­cer and moreover the relation of the whole to its set­ting—the table, the things around and about—as a composition and design. It is the same with people and their faces. One has to see them suddenly, removed from all associations of friendship or intimacy, and just concentrate upon the shape and color of their fea­tures—the mass of the hair, the general spacing and pro­portion of the build of their features. It is a sort of detachment from the ordinary world, a sitting back and taking note of the things that usually pass one by —a child taking notes, as Burns said.

7th Question: Should we concentrate entirely upon drawing, on trying to acquire proficiency in drafts­manship, before beginning to paint?

Answer: The answer is definitely—no! If you separate drawing from painting you will fail to develop all sense of tone and color values. When one comes to paint, after a course of drawing in black and white, it will be like tinting a drawing with color, for the two aspects have been separated in the mind and do not easily come together again. All painting is also drawing, drawing with brush or palette knife, because each stroke must make a definite shape—have an end as well as a begin­ning—and by keeping the two things together as one from the very start, you will find your sense of tone and color values much more highly developed.

8th Question: Are expensive outfits absolutely essen­tial in order to begin to paint properly?

Answer: Again the answer is a definite "No! "There is, of course, a certain amount of expense when starting, but if you avoid the made-up-ready-to-use outfits and gradually acquire the necessary tubes of paint and brushes and make your own palette and certain other things which are easy to make, you need not involve yourself in a very great expense. Of course, the things you do buy must be looked after well and treated with the utmost care. It is better to get good brushes, for in­stance, and look after them well, than to buy inferior, badly made brushes and treat them carelessly. Remem­ber always to put the caps back on the tubes after you have squeezed out the paint. But you must not be too cautious about the amount of paint you squeeze out on the palette. It is at this point that you must cast thought of expense to the winds and become generous, for too little paint spoils many beginners' efforts.

9th Question: How far does emotion, or temperament, override the control of technique, in the art of paint­ing?

Answer: It is always wise to consider your feelings as being the most important and necessary part of your artistic self, for without emotional response to visual things, no painting is worth while. Of course, there has to be a good deal of mental work also governing and directing the feelings and responses to stimulation by the color, shape, and line. The emotion must come first and then the head work afterwards. Technique alone will produce nothing worth while. That is why, when you are painting entirely for pleasure you should not get overworried about the technical details but go out boldly and strongly for expressing, at all costs, your feeling for, or about, the things you like rather than their exact delineation in detail. Intuition is exercised when mind and heart, feeling and thought go together, and intuition will guide you to finding just the right expression.

10th Question: Are such things as exaggeration and distortion allowable in producing good painting?

Answer: Yes, all these things which seem to look out of place when taken by themselves may, if rightly used, help in getting over your message. You must remem­ber that you are not copying what you see in any literal sense, but interpreting the things as sensed and felt emotionally. It is just the same as poetry or a short story, where greater truth, more forceful point, can be given by emphasizing certain things and omitting others. These things should not be done as a fad or to be in the fashion of the moment, but strictly to enhance the view of things that you wish to express.

11th Question: What is the essential difference in sub­ject and technique between water color and oil paint­ing?

Answer: Water colors are a beautifully transparent medium and the guiding of limpid washes of color into their position on gleaming white paper is the chief art to master. Plenty of clean water, plenty of rags, and some good big brushes, are the chief essentials. You cannot put one wash on the top of another until the first one is dry, so you are limited in this way and cannot rush your work. Light, airy subjects, where the glow of the color washes are seen to their best advantage, are the subjects most suitable. Oil paint is a denser me­dium and can give far more density of tone value than water color. You can run the whole gamut of tone from bright light to dark shadow, and as you can always scrape off the paint if you wish to alter your picture, you can keep on working on your canvas until you get the desired effect. Alterations in water color, on the other hand, nearly always lead to disaster. The subjects one can choose for oils are far more varied; in fact, with oil paints almost any and every conceivable subject can be attempted. You can start straightaway with the full depth of tone and need not work up from light to dark as in water-color painting.

12th Question: Are the many differing styles observ­able in present-day painting a good thing?

Answer: On the whole it is a very healthy sign that there is so much experimentation in present-day art. In the old days there were only a very limited num­ber of ways of painting a picture, but today you can choose from a wide range. Freshness of vision—having a definite personal outlook and attitude to things—is the essential. Each individual has a way of seeing which is unique to himself and he must try to find the right technique and medium which will give expression to that unique personal way of seeing. This will solve the question of which is the right type of medium and method to use. Much experimentation is essential and the way of trial and error is always the best.

13th Question: Does criticism by friends, even the most sympathetic of friends, help in one's creative work as a painter?

Answer: Yes—if you do not take the criticism to heart and also, what is more important, if you do not attempt to alter or modify your own view, because of anything said by anyone else. Perhaps encouragement is the only real help that your friends can give. But you must be stout-hearted and able to stand remarks passed by other people without letting them deflect or diminish your enthusiasm and perseverance. Remember that no one else sees in just the way you do and no one else can im­prove your view of things—it is only the constant prac­tice of seeing and expressing in terms of your chosen medium, that gives added strength to your work.

14th Question: Is painting with a palette knife, almost exclusively, a justifiable technique of oil painting?

Answer: This, of course, is a very personal matter. I myself have consistently used the palette knife as a main tool for painting all types of pictures for very many years and found it exactly suited to my vision, and indeed a most excellent method. But many claim that it is not real painting and that brushes are the only tools for oil painting. It is only for certain kinds of strong impressionistic pictures that the thick paint and the palette knife strokes are exactly suited; therefore, on the whole, it is wise to use brushes for the most part and experiment with palette knife painting if you feel it will fit your type of vision of things better than the brush.

15th Question: How does one start painting a person's face or figure, and is such a thing possible without a study of anatomy?

Answer: If you are interested in faces and people above all other subjects, by all means start straight­away drawing and painting them. Try to see them in broad general terms of color patches, rather than in de­tails of features, and also try to render the solidity of the head or figure by thinking of the head as a sphere and the body as a number of boxes and tubes. People, while the most interesting subjects of all to paint, are probably the most difficult, for they are always moving, and problems are created by the interaction between their feelings and thoughts and those of the artist.

I do not think it is necessary to have a knowledge of anatomy although a slight knowledge of the skull and the general bone formation is a help. But the great thing is to concentrate on the lines and shapes and colors that attract and interest you and put these down fearlessly, not considering or worrying about how ac­curate they are. Again, it is self-expression of your own viewpoint that matters all the time.

16th Question: Is it necessary to conform to set rules of composition, in order to compose a good picture?

Answer: No. Working out a composition on strictly conventional rules of composition is a dead proceeding. It is as well to start with the thing or point that inter­ests you most and then work out to the edges of your given space, be it canvas or paper. You should have some idea of the general shapes that you wish to have in the picture and not just start off hoping that you will get things in their allotted places by a fluke. A small thumbnail sketch of the whole picture in very simplified form is a very good idea, to place the main masses and lines and the relations of dark shapes to light ones. This small preliminary sketch can be either in black and white (using a crayon or soft pencil) or in a few simple colors. Pastels are very good for this pur­pose.

17th Question: What part does a knowledge of the fundamental geometry of the sphere, cube, cone, and cylinder play in helping one to paint?

Answer: It does help to give a feeling of substance and depth to your work if you can, without straining your natural vision at all, see the third-dimensional aspect of things in nature. A tree in full leaf for instance, is not just flat, but goes round, and has depth as well as height and breadth. Conveying this impression is a matter of shading or making an alteration to the color according to which plane it is in, whether the front or the sides; and the sense of space and air behind things is conveyed by close observation of the contours and the lightening or darkening of the colors, according to what is behind each object.

18th Question: Is abstract painting justified—and all the other so-called "advanced" methods used by some artists today?

Answer: Yes, abstract painting, in which there are no actual objects reproduced, but just the simple essence of shapes, the square, the oblong, the circle, the trian­gle, and so forth, to make up the whole design of the picture, this abstract art is justified as reducing paint­ing to its uttermost simplicity. It is only an exceptional artist who has this almost mathematical love of, and interest in, pure shape, and of course it is stupid to paint abstract pictures unless you feel deeply and in­tensely that only in this way can you express what you feel about things you see—you reduce them to their permanent logical conclusion of varying shapes and un­ify these shapes in your picture. All the other so-called "advanced-art" experiments are equally justified if they are sincere expressions. This is a wonderful time for experiment and for giving full vent to whatever ideas and visions you may have as you begin to see life in pictorial terms. These are, after all, but patches of color—"stains" if you like—on paper, wood, board, or canvas.

19th Question: How far does mounting, framing, and general presentation of pictures, affect their appeal?

Answer: If one wishes to send in the results of one's creative effort to selection committees (whose business it is to decide which pictures are exhibited, in all the multitude of exhibitions of pictures, open to outside exhibitors, up and down the country), then one has to pay careful attention to the right presentation of the work. That is, to see that it is suitably mounted and framed. This is always a tricky business and most art­ists find it irksome. It is probably best, if one can afford it, to go to an experienced framer and take his advice to begin with. A well-presented picture stands a hun­dred per cent better chance of being accepted for an exhibition than a shoddy, badly framed, or carelessly mounted picture of equal merit. You can look around second-hand shops and pick up useful frames some­times. Then you have to paint the picture of the size to fit the frame, and bring the frame up to date by cov­ering it with a coating of distemper, or alabastine, or similar substance, colored to the right color to suit the picture; not making the frame jump out away from the picture itself, nor too similar in color to the general color scheme of the picture, but of a tint that enhances the values and colors and improves the general appear­ance. The method of constant trial and error is here the only way.

20th Question: Is it possible to use the fragile me­dium of pastel successfully, to produce worthwhile pictures?

Answer: Yes. If pastel paintings are treated carefully and put under glass and backed up, so that air does not get to them, they keep perfectly for hundreds of years. The pastel medium is an excellent one to ex­periment with, for it needs probably less equipment than any other way of applying color, and you can get your color effects directly. Tinted boards, that do not bend or warp, are probably the best to use for work­ing with pastels, and you can get almost any color by "cross hatching" one color over the top of another. Freshness and delicacy of handling are possible with this medium.