Expand your knowledge and skill regarding composition. Through a series of lessons, video demonstrations and exercises, gain strategies that concentrate the visual impact of your images and convey your intended emotion.
This course costs $29.95. If you are interested, contact me using the form below (at the bottom of the page) and I will send you a paypal invoice.
What professional artists are saying about this course:
Every artist who struggles even a little with composition should watch Judith Reeve’s online presentation explaining rabatment composition techniques. The evaluation of Henri’s and Bellows’ paintings helps explain why we are drawn to these artists. I’m now looking at other painter’s works and seeing the influence and power of rabatment technique. Judith’s grasp and presentation are both accessible and detailed. The presentation of the application of rabatment in her own outdoor work literally has me looking at the tree lines around me in a different way. Bravo.
I found this to be a very rewarding and engaging course. Judith Reeve shows how effective rabatment can be as a tool in pictorial composition as well as how to practically apply it. She explains in a clear and straightforward way the philosophy and function of composition in pictures and gives examples of how great artists of the past have used rabatment. She includes exercises which I found to be very helpful in my understanding, having the student create an overlay of a rabatment armature over several George Bellows and Robert Henri paintings. Rabatment is not complicated to use but it opens up many possibilities.
I have been painting for over 20 years and know some composition methods but I can see in looking at a lot of my own work how using rabatment could have strengthened the compositions. Now that I have a better understanding, it will be exciting to apply this to my work.
I highly recommend this course.
If you love Judith Reeve’s blog, this Rabatment course will not disappoint. It is amazing to see how simple yet powerful the Rabatment tool is and why it was so commonly used in the 19th century.
This is the second time I have done this course and the layers of knowledge keep building. It’s like an iceberg, the more you review it, the more layers become unveiled, the deeper and clearer it becomes. Any artist at any level who completes this course will have gained much needed insight to this extraordinary compositional technique.
My favorite part of the whole course are the exercises. It’s one thing to watch a video (which helps tremendously to understand it) and an entirely different experience to apply it on your own. This course has taught me to search for the hidden structure in paintings. Not to just merely gaze with amazement but to actively seek out what works and why. It not only addresses the how, but the who, what, where, and why. The historical references and the explanation of emotional context behind masters works, really support just how powerful the Rabatment tool can be.
Judith has chosen to graciously share a life long career of research and hard work through her blog. It has enriched my life beyond what I thought it could or imagined it would. I eagerly await the arrival of her book and the next course. Thank you Judith, job well done!
Rachael Venezia
I think this is a great course! The design aspect of rabatment is both simple and complicated. Judith Reeve breaks it down into very manageable and practical components. I love how she demonstrates the use of rabatment by some of the masters and how she applies it on a practical basis in her own work. I’ve used it in my own paintings and it takes away the stressful aspect of, “will this design work?” which lets me get on to other considerations while painting.
I’ve also used rabatment to see how some painters, such as Wolf Kahn, might have applied it, just as a test, and the works I overlaid the system over lined up perfectly! It was so exciting.
One of the best things was seeing how it could be used to show or design where the visual energy force would lead. It’s definitely intuited in master works, but to understand the underlying structure was fantastic indeed! I will review these lessons several more times as each time I get something new and more concrete from Judith Reeve’s explanations.
In each of three sections, you will view four instructional videos along with additional materials to facilitate your own research with further readings from my library. There is a downloadable PDF of assignments which includes notes on the ‘Classic Requirement’, images of those artists under discussion in the videos and an opportunity to overlay a rabatment grid to paintings by these artists. These assignments in each section will help you think about making this method practical in your own work. This process will lead you to examine your own artistic interests and consider how rabatment can strengthen them.
Students are invited to contact me to discuss their work, as well as any weaknesses they wish to tackle. I have found that studying art is a lifelong pursuit where one will never get to the end of that ever expanding road of knowledge. Persevere and enjoy the journey.
This course costs $29.95
If you are interested, contact me using this form and I will send you a paypal invoice.