Bernie Dellario tasked our zoom-based art group with painting a fairly complicated scene using only a palette knife. The idea was to force ourselves to simplify. I selected a photo that I’d taken at a Nats night game, courtesy of friends Doug and Toni. I loved the vibrant colors, the dramatic lighting, the sharp green grass, the movement of the crowd and vendors. . . .
Here’s the painting and references. A note for composition buffs: For a bit of extra drama and clarity, I combined positions of orange hands from the two photos. I also omitted the wonderful yellow foul marker because it would been too much for a small square painting. . . . Maybe I’ll do a larger version some time so I can add that color into the mix.
At the Nats. Oil on Arches Huile Paper. 10″ x 10″.
Took an online workshop recently from Zoey Frank ~~ ‘self-portraits from observation’. It was weeks long – with almost 300 students (critiqued by five or six assistants). I didn’t get around to finishing the one self-portrait I started – just made a couple of smaller studies . . . before giving up in boredom at my composition.
1st composition – too cutsie by half (or two-thirds). Oil on Arches Huile paper. 6″ x 8″.
2d composition. oil on Arches Huile paper. 6″ x 8″.
Enlargement of 2d composition, 1st pass. Oil on linen panel. 16″ x 20″..
Documenting what I was ‘observing’ in 2d composition.
Second pass on the enlarged painting. Not sure if/when I’ll do more.composition, first pass. oil on linen panel. 16″x20″.
I’m now taking a watercolor class with Ed Praybe. He tasked us with doing THREE monochromatic self-portraits during one week – facing front & diagonally to each side. Under the short and specific deadline, I produced these three. Warning – it’s impossible to smile AND paint simultaneously, but . . . here they are anyway.
In the most recent session with Bernie Dellario, my ‘7 Palettes’ buddies, sister Ceci and a few other folks, we made speedy, simplified interpretations of several Old Master paintings. With a limited palette of the 3 primary colors and about 20-30 minutes each, I painted these images :
A figurative, after the nude Venus of Urbino, painted by Titian (1538); a floral, after a magnificent bouquet by van Veerendael (1662); and a quick gouache study of Madonna and Child, after a beautiful one by Bellini (1510).
Venus of Urbino, Titian.
After Titian’s Venus of Urbino. Oil on loose linen. 16″ x 9.75″.
Bouquet of Flowers in Crystal Vase, van Veerendahl.
After van Veerendahl’s Bouquet of Flowers in Crystal Vase. Oil on loose linen, 9.5″ x 13″.
Madonna and Child, Bellini.
After Bellini’s Madonna and Child. Gouach on watercolor paper. 5″ x 6″.
Ooof! I did one of these challenges not long ago, but here goes! Day 1 of my mission to share something from my art, my studio, or my life for ten consecutive days, no explanation needed, and nominate someone to do the same. I nominate Penny Smith to share some of her beautiful artwork and carry on the call. The idea is to promote positivity and bring art into each other’s lives.
Here’s what’s on my easel at the moment — inching toward a dual portrait of my deceased brother-in-law Albert ‘Terp’ Ward, and his widow, Donna Garnett.
Double Portrait – 2d session
Initial drawing, using Catherine Kehoe’s method of building a web of intersecting lines until features emerge.
Painters have a wide variety of ‘tube colors’ to use in trying to achieve their desired hues. I’ve got 30 or 40 tubes of almost every color you can imagine, most of them untouched. For quite awhile, I’ve opted to limit the number of tubes I use, challenging myself to mix a broad variety of colors from a handful of basic hues. Painters call this a ‘limited palette’. It lightens the load of what you have to carry around with you and it helps give a unity of color to your painting. Nice attributes.
There’s no specified set of colors for a limited palette. In the past, I’ve typically used a ‘split primary’ group, which includes two versions of each primary color, plus white and maybe black. Each of the two selected primaries ‘bends’ toward a different adjacent secondary color. For instance, cadmium red tends toward orange (yellow), while alizarin crimson tends toward a purple (blue). Blues may include phtalo or cerulean blue which tend toward green (yellow) and ultramarine blue which leans toward purple (red). Split yellows might include cadmium yellow light, which tends green (yellow), and cadmium yellow, which tends toward orange/red.
If you want to mix a bright saturated orange using such a palette, you’d combine cadmium red and cadmium yellow, rather than alizarin red and/or cadmium yellow light – a combo that produces duller, less saturated oranges. And so on.
Here are a few of my paintings using the split primary palette.
Great Falls, Virginia. Oil on Linen. 20×16.
After the Wedding. Oil on Linen. SOLD
The End. Oil on Arches Huile Paper.
Patient Reader. Oil on Arches Huile Paper.
Two Shells, Three Pearls. Oil on ARches Huile Paper.
More recently, as a result of a zoom class with Bernie Dellario and a number of painting buddies, I’ve been working with an even MORE limited palette — just three primaries + white & a neutral earth red: Hansa yellow; pyrole red; ultramarine blue; transparent red oxide and Titanium white. What a challenge, but I think I’m getting the hang of mixing a broad range of colors from these meager starting points. Here are some recent paintings using this palette.
Breakfront. 6×8. Oil on Arches Huile paper
Goldfish from Above. 6×8. Oil on Arches Huile paper.
Cuban Flamenco Dancers. 10×8. Oil on Arches Huile paper.
On the Dock. 10×8. Oil on Arches Huile paper.
Oakleaf Hydrangea Leaf in Fall. 9×12. Oil on Arches Huile paper.
Here is the series of monochrome studies, all 6″ x 8″, done during the workshop with Bernie Dellario. Such a concentrated repetition of that exercise was useful in helping us spot values quickly.
I just finished an intensive four day workshop with outstanding local artist and teacher, Bernie Dellario. We were expected to make up a ‘color chart’ exploring the ways in which 3 tube colors (yellow, red & blue) + white could mix together to make virtually all the colors you might want.
We also painted ten 3-value monochrome paintings; ten 3-value color paintings; and a plein air painting which we then translated into a larger ‘studio painting’ (hopefully retaining the 3-value structure of the studies). Here’s my 16″ x 20″ studio painting of our cannas, through which we can enjoy our neighbor’s yard.
Cannas, Bamboo & Joe Pye?? Oil on linen panel. 16×20.
Here are the initial monochrome and color studies. Note that I included the bushy Joe Pye plant (?) in the black & white study; left it out of the color study; and then re-inserted it in the larger piece. Am glad I did – it’s now my favorite part of the painting!
It was Day 7 (and I was in a chatty mood): Hmmmm. Here’s a little still life I did day before yesterday. Dear cousins want oysters & pearls for their daughter’s new office. This was the first take; am now working on something bigger with a single oyster. Will share when it’s done.In the meantime, what are your thoughts on my current dilemmas: I set the oysters up on a white tablecloth (bottom photo), but the first cut was perhaps too monochrome & bland; so in the next pass I pushed the cloth toward lavender. I think it may now be ‘too too’. The background behind is probably too similar. Finally, the cloth, as painted, is wonky & needs to be reshaped & redone in any event. Ideas, y’all???
Shells and Pearls. Oil on Arches Huile Paper. 10 x 12.
I’m heartsick at the events of the last few days. Clearly there are more than enough bad folks to go around, but DAMN. Black folks have had a rope around their necks or a knee on their throats or a bullet in their backs for far too long. I heard wonderful Van Jones on TV last night, describing ‘the talk’ that each black parent must gave to their young children of a certain age, and these words stuck out: your skin is your sin. I had to make a quick painting this morning before heading into an art workshop filled with ole white women making fabric sculptures of themselves. How quaint.
Your Skin is Your Sin. Oil on Arches Huile Paper. 12 x 9.
For Day 6, I posted a more conventional figurative piece ~~ a young visitor who plopped herself down to wait til her mom finished visiting. She was such a sweet ‘Patient Reader’.
Patient Reader. Oil on Arches Huile Paper. 12 x 12.
