Charles Pfahl, Artist at Work

Dust jacket notes: "Charles Pfahl is one of the most brilliant traditional painters on the New York scene. This richly illustrated book is a closeup view of his working methods and his spectacular command of oil painting techniques. Charles Pfahl: Artist at Work opens with a detailed description of Pfahl's working methods: where he gets his ideas and how he develops them into paintings; posing the model and planning and composing the picture; lighting - both indoor and outdoor; his palette and how he plans the colors for his paintings; preliminary drawings and color sketches; and finally, a description of how he paints a typical picture in oil. The second part is a series of step-by-step photographic demonstrations of paintings in progress, with detailed technical captions showing how each step is painted. The demonstrations include a clothed female figure, a female nude, a male nude, a figure in an interior, and finally, an interior painted as a king of 'still life.' The demonstrations are especially instructive because many closeups show significant areas of the paintings at various stages, revealing the texture of the paint and the subtle brushwork. The final section is a one-man show of finished paintings, reproduced full-page size, with technical captions on how each painting was executed. The paintings in the one-man show include nude and clothed figures, figures in interior settings, plus portraits and self-portraits, and finally a few still lifes - all remarkable for their technical mastery. Charles Pfahl: Artist at Work is a valuable book for everyone who paints - and for everyone who wants to see how a top professional artist works." 144 pages. 9 x 12 inches, 80 color plates, 28 black-and-white illustrations, index.