Copy the Old Masters - it is a good way to learn!
 

I learned to paint in that grand style by copying Old Master paintings.

When I was learning to paint, I spent two years doing nothing but copying old paintings I loved. I was not able to go to any museum to do this, I simply got the best print I could find of what I wanted to paint and worked from that in my studio.

There is a book that helped me at that time and it is "How to Paint Like the Old Masters" by Joseph Sheppard. You can find it on Amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/IS...rokeofgeniusA/
Although I find the paintings in this book somewhat vulgar, it was helpful in that it showed the stages of several different kinds of underpainting technique.

Here is my copy of Isabella Coymans after Frans Hals.

"Young Man" by Giovanni Boltraffio

My copy of "French Maiden" by Corot

My copy of "The Calmody Children" by Sir Thomas Lawrence

An unfinished copy
 

This is my copy of "The Waterbearer" by Ingres. It is unfinished and left as an underpainting.

See another underpainting and additional information at "Underpainting" http://forum.portraitartist.com/show...=&threadid=190

Karin:

Wonderful work! I agree completely. It is simply amazing how much you can learn from copying a master work.

Here is my copy of William Bouguereau's 1877 painting "The Storybook":

http://www.fineportraitsinoil.com/Storybook-300.jpg

And my copy of Hans Holbein's 1527 painting of "Sir Thomas More":

http://www.fineportraitsinoil.com/ThomasMore-300.jpg

This is my copy of M. Granet by Ingres.

Karin, Michael,

I am very surprized at your work.
They are dignified and are very advanced.

The book, "How to Paint Like the Old Masters" by Joseph Sheppard, is available in Japan which translated to Japanese.
I bought the book, years ago.
Karin's comments are just correct, I agree.

I am interested in copy of old masters work, very much.
I want to challenge.
The original picture of high quality is available from web site, from ARC for example.
I like William Bouguereau very much.:)

Is there any points I had better to know, about copy, beforehand?
Please give me some advice.

Yoshiharu:

Greetings, I have seen your work in the critiques forum - you are making great strides. :)

My best advice when copying a master work is to get the best reference available to you. In my case, I found paintings that had large museum posters available of them. I used these as my base reference and found other images of the same painting in books, on the Internet, etc.

For The Storybook, I visited the LACMA museum in L.A. and viewed the original through binoculars - it was about 9 feet up on a wall behind some furniture on display. I gridded the painting off on a sheet of paper and took fairly copious notes for each square noting color, visible brush strokes, etc.

And finally, if you choose to copy any work, then make your copy at least 5% off of the size of the original. Never paint the original artist's signature. Sign your own name and put "After" and the original artists name. I do this in paint on the front, and on the back in pencil.

Good Luck! :D