Changes…

It’s been a while since I last posted. There has been so many changes, some good and one not so good.

Let’s get the not so good change out of the way so we can focus on positive things! I lost my full time job as a graphic designer. The company I was working for is a recreations and vacations company – thus depedent on discretionary spending. And with the way the economy was going, discretionary spending is often the first to be cut back. Hence, layoffs.

However, for each door that closes, a new one opens, so I am now an independent contractor, which will allow me to make some money from design projects. No project too small, and willing to work withing budget, so if you need, or know of someone who needs some graphic design or web design job done, contact me.

And yet another door opens – I have relocated from Vancouver to a small town called Wells, BC, for the summer, and possibly beyond. This means more time and more opportunity to paint. Still lifes, landscapes,, especially landscapes, and all the time to improve and experiment with my painting.

Right now is my opportunity to focus as a full time painter as well, get better at my craft, and build up the series I’ve started a year ago and still continuing – the Willow River, one of the main rivers here in Wells/Barkerville area.

I will be posting more often now, musing on art-making, what’s going on in the art world, and miscellany.

I leave you with this latest piece, Willow River bank, completed last month.

Willow River Bank - 16" x 16" oil on birch panel

Sunkissed, almost done.

Almost done. I just have to finetune the glass.

Sunkissed

More Sunkissed

After session 2, I added more white to the background, and ended up kind of making everythingn look flat. There’s no sense of dimension or depth beyond the subject matter.

After Session 2

I decided during Session 3 to focus on the wooden box that serves as a table. The challenge is to make the wooden box realistic, as in general finished wood products are kind of hard to nail down. To identify the colours, wood is generally “orange”, but not  chromatic orange.

Fine-tuning the wooden box

Maybe what I should have done was really focus on the back first. In any case, I wanted the background to be dimensional, not flat, and wanted it on the cold side, to allow the subject matter be the “hotness” of the painting. White completes to much, so I chose the complementaries of yellow and orange, which is of a warmish purple – purple with a hint of red in it, but still yet blueish – a mixture of ultramarine and dioxizine purple.

After Session 3

Now, the lemons and tulips are really popping, but you see where there’s a bit of a halo between the box and the wall? That’s why I should have focused on the wall first, then work on the box.

Now it is too purply, or rather, too chromatic of a background, and my next step is to keep the value but reduce the chroma on the wall area, and then go back to the lemons and the leaves and redefine the edges of the box.

Work in Progress – Sunkissed

Something cheerful, and spring-like. Anticipating spring, celebrating spring. Because the weather’s been spring-like, and tulip season is just around the corner!

Setting up the stage.

Continuing with my citrus theme, I chose a trio of lemons, but rather than just focusing on lemons, I thought why not add some flowers to the lemons. Tulips are coming into season, so I chose a bunch of yellow tulips, to tie in with the lemons. I also had a simple glass that I could use for the vase, and arranged the set-up. I decided on an “L” armature for this one, using the painter’s box as a stage. Lighting was important – when I set this up, the light was good, a beautiful clear day, with northern light exposure. When I returned on Sunday to continue to paint this, it was raining and overcast, which didn’t work. I had to add a daylight bulb to brighten up the flowers.

Underpainting on a prepared panel

I had a panel that I prepared with a mixture of Venetian Red and Silver White, thinned out with OMS. Overall, with this underpainting, I’m going for a warm undertone. I thinly blocked in the colours and shapes, and started to whiten out the background.

About 2/3 done.

With the colours and shapes blocked in, I then apply the colours more liberally, but still keeping it thin, as I would go over it again with a medium (Walnut Alkyd Medium) to bring out the light. For now, though, I defined the shapes more, such as the lemons, the stems and leaves, and the flowers. I will start adding in a light blue background, to help make the yellows pop out more. I would also start adding in contrast by making some dark contrasts even darker.

Heda Still Life Study: done

I’m done with this.

1) Don’t go cheap on surface, and if you do, at least prime it well. It really makes a difference. It was frustrating all the way to the end and is primarily the reason I’m stopping now. I can’t stand it!!!

2) wow, it’s easy to paint an illusion of glass! I was thinking as I looked at Heda’s original closely and I realize that you don’t paint glass. You just paint the highlights where the light hits the glass.

3) I need to stop being afraid of high contrast. For example, the shine of the cloth on Heda’s original is much higher than my shine.

Heda Still Life Study - done for now

Heda Still Life Study – Sessions 1 & 2

As I mentioned, I thought I’d use this cheapo art board that’s a cheap imitation of the Ampersand gessoboard since it would only be for a study. So far, I hate it. It’s awful, and in hindsight, I should have put a layer of gesso on it, or better yet the Gamblin ground. I don’t know what it is, but it seems to absorb the painting, making it dull and flat, with a chalky or dried clay-like texture. So next time I’d get the actual Ampersand Gessoboard, as it works quite well. Or make up some of my own small panels using a sheet of doorskin, priming it with Gamblin’s oil ground.

Generally when one do a study, especially from a masterpiece, one start off by sketching the compostion, the shapes and the lines.Basically getting the feel of the placement. In this case, I skipped this step, and I would advise anyone not to do that. Sketching out a painting first, helps with composition, perception, placement, line and form.

I started with a turp wash of yellow ochre/ultramarine blue – just enough blue to dull down the Y.O. but not too much. I wanted to get a greenish side of YO.

Then I mixed some Y.O. with Ivory Black, to get a deep dark greenish shade, and used that to create the shapes.

Session 1: Underpainting of Heda’s still life copy

On the 2nd night, session 2, I picked up a tube of Holbein’s Green
Earth, as it seems that green earth was a popular green in Vermeer’s
time, so figured I’d try this colour. It is a beautiful green, but a
weak colour in mixing so I had to be careful not to overpower it with
other additions.

Session 2: Working over underpainting

Study of a Masterpiece

Taking a little break between paintings, and focusing on smaller sizes. The tangelos was an example. The painting I’m working on right now, is a study from a masterpiece

Still Life with Gilt Globlet, by , 1635

When one is doing a study on a masterpiece, either they paint the entire image, or they focus on a small element of the photo. I chose to do the latter, which is the lower right corner:

Close-up image, courtesty of Danny van Ryswyk

People have different purposes for doing copies. Composition, use of colour, brush strokes, and subject matters are what I’m looking for in this study:

Subject matter: I am currently working on a series of citrus fruits for my stil life project, so it was natural that I would focus on this close-up.

Composition: I think composition is important, as a good painting needs to draw your eyes in. Framing a subject, where the subject is taking you and such.

Use of colour: This painting was done in the 17th century, where pigments we have now weren’t available then. So, the challenge here is to try to avoid “modern” colours and see if I can come up with mixtures that closely resemble the colours you see here. This can be a bit difficult as they would have used certain colours like “lead tin yellow” that aren’t widely available now.

Brush strokes: always a good thing to practice on.

So I started on this last night, on a cheap 8×10 artboard (kind of like a gessoboard, but even cheaper). I hate the surface, and in hindsight I should have added a layer of acrylic primer to smooth things out, but this is a study where I learn from trial and error. I mixed some yellow ochre with some ultramarine blue to get an imprimatura (base colour), and then mixed the yellow ochre with some ivory black to get a dull olive green, and painted in forms and shapes, of the table cloth, drapery, and lemon. I left it aside to let it dry so I can work on it some more. Tomorrow I will take a photo of it before working on it some more.

Minneola Tangelos

A small piece, done in one afternoon.

Minneola Tangelos

5″ x 7″, oil on panel

Skeena, finito.

Definitely calling this finished. Varnishing is next once this is dry. Then I’m going to hide it somewhere. Or maybe not varnish at all and just hide it. It’s too Thomas Kincaid for my liking. Bleh.

Self-doubt

I sometimes hit a period of self-doubt. I wonder, am I out of my league here, trying to tackle this project? Why does the colours seem wrong? Is it too saturated? My mountain forms doesn’t look right either. These are the self-doubts I face the more I progress on this project. Some artists call this the “ugly stage” where nothing seem to look right. Sometimes they just black-X it, sometimes they just abandon it, sometimes they turn it into something else, and sometimes they just prod on until it starts to look better. I’ve been advised that sometime the best thing to do is just put it aside and do something else as a break, then go back to it with a fresh pair of eyes.

Progress: February 1

So I may take a break from this for a bit, and start on some smaller still life paintings.

Spring is coming, and I would like to enter some competition based on the spring celebration theme. I’ve thought of a still life involving potting and planting, so if I can get started on that, I may make the deadline for the competition.

What do you do with left over paints that isn’t much to save for the next session, but too much to just casually throw out?  I use them for experimenting on smaller canvases like 10″ x 10″. This one below is just a fun session using just palette knife. No brushes.

Leftovers