I have an open life drawing and painting session in my studio every Wednesday evening. In the most recent session a couple of days ago, we had a lovely young lady as a portrait model. I decided to try two things: one, use a very limited oil palette, and two, to try to approach the painting as much like my charcoal and pastel works as possible. Long-time readers (all three of you) will know that I've been struggling with this second issue. My charcoal and pastel works have been, I think, very successful, but I haven't been able to carry that feeling over into paint. At least not yet.
So here was the result:
I think this was pretty much a success as a painting. For one, it's a good likeness, and for another, there's a lot of fresh brushwork. It doesn't have the same feel as the charcoal and pastel works, but as I was working on it, there was much more of the same kind of thought process than there has been in previous attempts.
One of the reasons was the limited palette. I used:
Terra Rosa (a muted, slightly cool red)
Yellow Ochre (a muted yellow)
Chromatic Black (a new Gamblin product)
Burnt Umber (a dark brown)
Flake White Replacement (a slightly warm white)
This choice of colors is similar to the famous Zorn palette of one red, one yellow, one blue, and white. To this, I added a dark brown. Where's the blue, you say? It's the Chromatic Black. Yes, if you add white, you'll see that it really is a muted dark blue. And to make things really odd, Chromatic Black is actually made up of Quinacridone Red plus Phthlao Emerald, two colors that are on opposite sides of the color wheel. And when you mix this red and that green, and add white, you'll see you have a blue. Go figure.
So work on a figure is what I did. I started by choosing a 16x12 panel with a slightly warm tone. Then I blocked in the figure with a mixture of the black and burnt umber. The umber knocked down the blueness, so it was even more neutral. Then I refined it into a pretty-well-developed 2-value rendering. Actually, it wasn't strictly two values; there were slight variations in the very lights and very darks, just enough to add some volume. When I was satisfied with the black and white, I started applying color. The skin tones were the terra rosa, yellow ochre, and white, all with a little variation in the mixtures to lean toward one color or another. Her shirt was just the chromatic black, a bit of white, and a touch of the terra rosa.
And that was it. The result, I think, came out pretty well. The more I use limited palettes, the more I like them.
So here was the result:
I think this was pretty much a success as a painting. For one, it's a good likeness, and for another, there's a lot of fresh brushwork. It doesn't have the same feel as the charcoal and pastel works, but as I was working on it, there was much more of the same kind of thought process than there has been in previous attempts.
One of the reasons was the limited palette. I used:
Terra Rosa (a muted, slightly cool red)
Yellow Ochre (a muted yellow)
Chromatic Black (a new Gamblin product)
Burnt Umber (a dark brown)
Flake White Replacement (a slightly warm white)
This choice of colors is similar to the famous Zorn palette of one red, one yellow, one blue, and white. To this, I added a dark brown. Where's the blue, you say? It's the Chromatic Black. Yes, if you add white, you'll see that it really is a muted dark blue. And to make things really odd, Chromatic Black is actually made up of Quinacridone Red plus Phthlao Emerald, two colors that are on opposite sides of the color wheel. And when you mix this red and that green, and add white, you'll see you have a blue. Go figure.
So work on a figure is what I did. I started by choosing a 16x12 panel with a slightly warm tone. Then I blocked in the figure with a mixture of the black and burnt umber. The umber knocked down the blueness, so it was even more neutral. Then I refined it into a pretty-well-developed 2-value rendering. Actually, it wasn't strictly two values; there were slight variations in the very lights and very darks, just enough to add some volume. When I was satisfied with the black and white, I started applying color. The skin tones were the terra rosa, yellow ochre, and white, all with a little variation in the mixtures to lean toward one color or another. Her shirt was just the chromatic black, a bit of white, and a touch of the terra rosa.
And that was it. The result, I think, came out pretty well. The more I use limited palettes, the more I like them.
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