The 20-minute-painting-a-day challenge

My painting class is over--so sad--but my teacher, Mark Andres, has thrown down the gauntlet, challenging me to do a 20-minute painting a day--all summer--focusing on "gesture, rhythm, movement and design".  I have to set a timer... when it goes off, the brush stops.  20 minutes; c'est tout.

So I started today.  The challenge landed whilst I was reading a bit of commentary on Fragonard's work, about how he was dissed for "...his ability to change handling from one moment to the next"... one critic thought it "...was an undesirable talent that rendered his manner 'uneven'."   WHAT?!  Never mind that every sort of paint handling Fragonard ever did was brilliant (imho!).  The narrative goes on to describe the term achevé:

However, a painting made with fire, with enthusiasm, and without too much refinement in the execution [le faire], often has more right to be called a finished [achevé] work than one that cost the artist much time and effort.

This second critic is much more favorably disposed to Fragonard's style, it would seem, although he is not referencing him directly in this passage:  "It is this appearance of facility, of certainty, and of enthusiasm in the execution that renders even the most delicate and the most masterful details without effort, and as if by chance.  It is this skillful handling of the brush or the chisel which lets one know that the artist, having a well-formed idea of what he wanted to make, has hit his mark with assurance and precision." [quote: Charles-Nicolas Cochin, fils]

That's the kind of facility I've admired in not only Fragonard but Sargent and Joaquim Mir and many other of "my new favorite painters" I've discovered over the past few years.  And that's how I think this most excellent assignment will influence me.  At any rate, I'm happy to take it on, and the top pic is my 20-min. version of Fragonard's The Bathers.

Well that was fun!!!  And of course, having all the leftover paint--which I pathologically can. not. waste.--I couldn't just stop painting so I grabbed a sheet of paper and taped it to a board and did a second version (pic #2).  That one took about 1-1/4 hr.  I may tweak it a little tomorrow.   Or not.  For sure, I'll be doing another 20-minuter tomorrow!

I think Fragonard is a good choice to initiate this new journey I've embarked on.  Doncha just love synchronicity?!

Note:  Quotes are from Fragonard Art and Eroticism, by Mary D. Sheriff.