Customer Reviews

Charles Pfahl, Artist at Work

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I got this book when it was still in print, and if you are a painter, I urge you to get it, as it's been impossible to find. Pfahl is a great painter, and this book, unlike many others, shows many step by step paintings. The paintings are large and the color is real good, in fact, just the slip cover alone is worth the price of the book, in my opinion, and this reproduction of it doesn't do it justice. I believe it will become one of your favorite books in your art collection.

One of the finer pieces of work in the Watson-Guptill catalog. Pfahl is really a painter's painter: atmospheric, Romantic images firmly grounded in the realist tradition.

Black cloth with silver details over boards; 143 pp; designed by Bob Fille.

Illustrations throughout, about 75% color and 25% b&w. Many full-page illustrations.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
The Concept
Posing and Composing
Lighting the Subject
Color

Tools and Materials
How Pfahl Draws in Oil
Pfahl Draws in Pastel
Framing the Picture

Demonstration 1: A Female Nude
Demonstration 2: A Clothed Female Figure
Demonstration 3: A Figure in an Interior
Demonstration 4: A Male Nude
Demonstration 5: An Interior

One-Man Show

Bibliography
Index

One of the finer pieces of work in the Watson-Guptill catalog. Black cloth with silver details over boards; 143 pp; designed by the great Bob Fille.

Pfhal is a real painter's painter. His work is Romantic and a little dreamy, possessing a current sensibility that is fully grounded in the realist tradition. He depicts figures and interiors with the splashy specificity reminiscent of Titian, Degas, and Vermeer. Not to say that he's derivative. This painter has his own eye; I find his compositional choices and his palette highly individualized. However, Pfahl is a descendant of some of the greatest painting traditions in Western culture.

Illustrations throughout, about 75% color and 25% b&w. Many full-page illustrations.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
The Concept
Posing and Composing
Lighting the Subject
Color

Tools and Materials
How Pfahl Draws in Oil
Pfahl Draws in Pastel
Framing the Picture

Demonstration 1: A Female Nude
Demonstration 2: A Clothed Female Figure
Demonstration 3: A Figure in an Interior
Demonstration 4: A Male Nude
Demonstration 5: An Interior

One-Man Show

Bibliography
Index