“CATTUS BOAT SHED”: Watercolors by Hank Bristol are often inspired by the marine coastlines of Maine and New Jersey.

By Thomas Kelly

Hank Bristol is a Rocky Hill watercolor painter. His self-taught technique is moody, colorful, and takes us to places that he frequents. The ocean and its environment are what he likes to portray.

Bristol taught at Princeton Day School for many years in the fields of history and social studies. He feels his original collegiate training as an architect and later as a photographer truly helped his painting by his scene blocking and well-honed drawing skills.

What are you communicating with your art?

I wish to create a sense of place with a subject as seen in its visual context. I want to convey the beauty by using watercolor as the medium. I am hoping the recreation of space, light, and motion produces some surprises for the viewer.

What made you decide on using watercolor as your primary medium?

Watercolor is the medium I like the best. I understand how the water reacts with the paint and sometimes goes its own way. It allows me to work light to dark, which is opposite of the way many oil painters work.

When I paint, I know how water behaves and thus I can achieve a more profound and meaningful work than in a more solid paint. The water flows and dances in my hand when I want it to. It dries when I’m done and I leave it alone. It awakens again, if I return, with endless possibilities and lessons for me to learn. I suppose it is my love of water, the manipulation of pigments, different from other paints, as well as my willingness to occasionally lose control. Hopefully the watercolor paint helps me achieve things that are beyond me.

Do you make thorough preparatory drawings?

Not often, but I can. My rendering comes through in the final layers, as I add important details and lift out the key highlights (whites).

How do you decide what size to make a specific painting?

Most of my watercolors are by nature small. I often begin with quick small sketches, especially with a new composition, seeking balance and values (contrast).

My larger paintings, 20”x30”, require bigger brushes, more water, and broader arm movements. Interestingly though, errors are less of a problem. In larger paintings, smaller risks are taken due to the size. If you know the composition and can build up the contrast of values over subsequent “washes” or layers. My paintings will often have six-eight layers (washes), and then some dark final details or added whites.

Your work has a spontaneous look to it. Is this planned or does it happen organically?

Yes, it’s like a dance. I often get a spontaneous look at a revisited or familiar place or composition. But I will also adjust a painting aggressively, as opportunities emerge. I will block in the colors with washes of paint and then carve in the details.

What fight/struggle do you have regarding your art?

Watercolors are relatively cheap. The works are smaller, easy to store/carry, and few chemicals. Also, traveling is a breeze. Public recognition for my work is slow, often by word of mouth. And watercolors are not such a hot topic that everyone is on top of what’s current. Critics are few and not always well-directed. What I mean is that I feel that often galleries and artist associations will judge you on either past tradition in the medium, or the overall consistency in your own work, over time.

My work sells nicely, but my style is not stagnant. One piece is “loose,” another “abstract,” or “detailed,” I hope appropriately.

Watercolors are not expensive typically and that makes them affordable. Last year I had two shows and sold close to 30 works. More recently, I made giclée prints of one of my works and sold most of them once the word got out.

Water scenes and seascapes inspire you. Do you have a special tie to these places?

Yes. I breathe salt air. My family has been visiting the coast of Maine for three generations and the New Jersey shore even longer. I love the New Jersey tidal grasses and the historic sailing catboats. I connect to our historic marine coastline and how to express it in new ways. There is a historic lineage of coastal artists who have painted work by which I am continually inspired.

Who were some of your influences and inspirations?

Of course, Andrew Wyeth, John Singer Sargent, J.M.W. Turner, Winslow Homer, and many others. In the 1970s I met Alfred Birdsey of Bermuda, and I watched him paint for 5 minutes max, wax on paper, as a resist, then the paint tube directly onto his brush. Then he was done. Magical. Then he would sell us a complete $5 painting. Amazing.

Did your career as a teacher influence your art or vice versa?

I followed the method of trying not to control, but to see what was possible and then go from there. I taught middle school where listening was very important, with affirmations and joining the journey. I am now teaching others to paint in watercolors.

What is most fun about being an artist?

I really like the receptions at exhibition openings. What an ego boost for an artist. Another fun thing I find is the promise of a stretched black sheet of watercolor paper. Also teaching others that it is all right to let go.

Have you seen your work evolve or change over the years?

Yes, more intensity these last six years after retiring from both school and ordained church work where I was a deacon. I feel I am painting more competently and have really moved from being a hobbyist to being a true artist. Recently, I’ve received more comments and interest than ever before on my work.

Where can we see your work?

I have exhibited at the Nassau Club and the Present Day Club in Princeton recently. I was able to show a wide array of work and it was well received. I will exhibit periodically in the Garden State Watercolor Society and the New Jersey Watercolor Society exhibitions. I have a tentative watercolor group exhibition scheduled for later this fall at Alfa Art Gallery in New Brunswick.

What is on the horizon? What are you looking forward to?

I look forward to the upcoming shows this fall. I’m also hoping to find a home gallery to sell my work. I did a lot of painting this summer and would love to be able to exhibit them. Admittedly I may need help to show my work better online and enhance my digital presence.

Follow Bristol on Instagram at hankbristol.art.