Paintings of France, Italy and Beyond

Following up on my previous post about the Rob Liberace’s portrait workshop, I thought I’d start this entry by posting my painting from day 2 of the class. This was a very different model from the one who sat for us on the first day:

Portrait study- “The Captain”, Oil, 20×16″

I heard quite a few people calling this gentleman the Captain, but I’m not sure if they were doing so because he actually was a captain, or just looked like one! In any event, he was a riot and really seemed to get a kick out of sitting for us. He was an excellent model, able to stay still for an extraordinary amount of time (which he attributed to the fact that he was a long-time turkey hunter.)

I got a little further along with this portrait than I had done on the first day, though I think I had a bit of a handicap to overcome. I had toned this canvas rather too dark. Prior to the class we were sent instructions to tone our canvases in acrylic to a middle value gray. I’m ususally pretty good with my value judgements, but I’d not used acrylics in a long time and they seemed to dry darker than I had expected them to. 

This ground had me feeling like I had to do a good deal of extra work to get rid of it so that I could acheive the fair complexion and hair of this gentleman. Normally the middle value gray would be a nice gauge  for judging mid tones, but with this model’s coloration especially, the darker than mid gray tone was just not helpful.

This next portrait below was actually not done in the workshop, but comes from a session last week after I returned back home. I met up with a local portrait group that meets weekly here in Richmond. I have actually wanted to meet up with this group for quite a while but for some reason the mid-week evening sessions have not jived with my schedule. Any way, this is Joey:

“Joey” (portrait study), 16×12, oil on linen

Since I knew we’d only have this model for a 3 hour segment of time, I thought I’d make it a little easier on myself by choosing a smaller canvas (toned in a light wash of burnt umber, on the spot). As it turned out, I didn’t get much farther with my level of finish; which is too bad because Joey had on a great oversized black leather jacket and was holding a guitar.

Nevertheless, I think this is my favorite alla prima portrait so far, as I was very happy with the likeness I was able to acheive. I  went about it in the same manner as the two previous studies, using same palette as I’d used in the portrait workshop. But this one just seemed to “click” a little better. Even though that electric blue could use some toning down around his jawline, I like what’s happening with the color sense and the brushwork.

I’m missing the portrait group’s meeting this week because I’m going to the Shins concert (woo hoo!) but I intend to keep up with them on as regular a basis as I am able. Whether or not I ever “do anything” formally with portraiture, I’ve made it my goal because I’m convinced that the challenge of working from the live model will improve my abilities to render and to see light and color more accurately overall.

Jennifer Young; Vibrant Landscapes
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In my previous post I mentioned an out of town trip last weekend. I was over in Colonial Beach VA pursuing one of my main 2009 goals  (exploring the figure) by taking another class with painter/portrait artist Robert Liberace. This class was a 2 day workshop on alla prima portrait painting. Since this is the way I am accustomed to painting with my landscapes (particularly smaller works and those done en plein air) I was really drawn to the class.

Rob is as enthusiastic and energetic as I remember him to be from my first class with him in figure drawing last semester at the Art League School. I am continually enthralled by his masterful demos, and I found it interesting that the process he set forth for this style of portraiture was very similar to the method I use to paint my landscapes.

The palette we used, however, was quite a bit different and more expansive than what I typically use for my landscapes; burnt umber, cad yellow light, followed by several reds, several blues, two violets and a couple of greens. He also used two different kinds of white, Titanium (a very strong, bright white) and Lead White (the most opaque of the whites.)

Rob began with an imprimatura (toning) in burnt umber on Ampersand panel, and a very quick and sketchy (though amazingly accurate) grisaile. From there he then built his way to layers of color from shadow to midtone, halftone and finally highlights. Of course he made it look so easy, but I soon found out otherwise!

The model I painted on this first day was a very stunning young lady who looked to be about 15 or 16. Turns out she was actually only 12. I think for her age and energy level she did exceedly well sitting for us, and it was a real visual treat to paint her. By the luck of the draw, I found myself setting up in a spot that put the model in complete profile. I’m not normally overly excited with profile views. In fact I find them boring. But the model had a great hairdo and a nice twist to her torso that actually enlivened my view and made it fun to paint:

She was wearing a great red satin dress in the Asian style, which went well with her beautiful golden skintone and almond shaped eyes. Unfortunately in the remaining time we had left to work (after Rob’s excellent demo) I got none of the dress, save for a brief outline. I did take a photo of her though, in case I decide to work more on the painting. But most times I leave my workshop studies as is, to serve as a reminder of what I learned and in what areas I still need to grow.

In any case, I  learned a lot from this first sitting. First of all, just as in plein air painting, it’s important to get your drawing down accurately and commit to your big idea as soon as possible. While the lighting in a portrait studio doesn’t change the way the natural light does en plein air, what does change incrementally is the model. It’s really hard for a model to get the exact same pose and facial expression after a break. And it’s also really hard to hold a pose  for any length of time (especially if you happen to be 12 years old!) So while it’s tempting to jump right in to color, Rob wanted us to spend a good deal of time first developing a strong grisaille and really fleshing out the portrait in it’s proper porportion, placement, light, shadow, and halftone– BEFORE putting down the first dab of color.

Another very important thing I learned once I moved beyond the grisaille had to do with painting children. As in landscape painting, it is oh so very easy to overdo it by getting lost in details. It’s an interesting dance; because while you want to accurately record what you see, too much unnecessary detail can detract from the character of the subject and weaken the overall painting. At about an hour into my painting I was well into color, painting in every shadow I could possibly see on the model’s face. I knew the likeness in her profile was pretty accurate, but still  I wasn’t getting her character–her “glow”. 

Then Rob came by and said, “You’re aging her.” Taking my brush, with literally two sweeping strokes he pulled some of the middle skintone I had put down on her upper cheek and quickly swept it downward, blending away almost all of the shadow work I’d done around her mouth and nose, leaving only part of the cheekbone shadow and the shadow work I’d done under her jaw. I just stood there and chuckled. It was like one of those “miracle line eraser” wrinkle ads you see on the Internet.

“You just took 10 years off of her, ” I said. Ah, if only it were that easy in real life!

p.s. The above 20×16″ study was after about 2 to 2 1/2 hrs. of work. The sketch in the upper right corner of the canvas was a hands-on instructive from Rob early on, because the initial lines of my grisaille around the eyes were too juicy and lacked definition.

Jennifer Young; Vibrant Landscapes
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Well there’s nothing like computer woes and an out of town trip to keep up the momentum for a painting demonstration! But at long last, here is the resolution to the  demo I started in late April:

When I last left off, I had my concept and composition well planned out, so now I set to work on finishing.  This involves painting in the foreground and punching up the highlights of the middle distance and background, where needed.

But something happens at this point. I kind of get too lost in the irises, making them too defined and pronounced. Soon I find my tunnel vision has gotten me so lost in the irises that they start to take over.

Argh! Attack of the irises! They’ve taken over and are rather too big and too saturated, creating more of a competition with the old abbey.  I’ve also lost the lower wall in the middle distance almost entirely, which I rather liked, as it helped to lead the eye further into the painting.

My solution? Basically I scraped down the entire lower portion of the painting! Eh,  it happens. The paint had become too thick to really rework, and sometimes it’s easier and less distracting to just scrape it off in order to open it back up. In this case I felt a ”do-over” was warrented.

“Irises at Abbaye Nouvelle”
Oil on Canvas, 40″x30″
Click here for more info!

Ahh…better. (At least I think so!) I’ve gotten my herb-covered wall back, and reworked the irises in the foreground so as to frame but not overpower. I’ve treated them a bit more impressionisitcally too,  to flow better with the rest of the painting. I also decided to tone down some of the greens and golds in the middle distance to make them “sit back” in the picture plane.

At this point I’ll conclude. If I touch it any more it will be only a tweak here and there. I’ve shot and reshot the final several times but we are getting such dark days lately with all this rain that I can’t seem to get the nuances in the colors quite right in the photo. This picture is close, but I’ll likely try another shot once the sun comes out.

Jennifer Young; Vibrant Landscapes
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This post continues a demo I started last week. To start from the beginning, click here!

Before going too much further I like to get a good feel for my area of interest, so I lay in the general colors and highlights of the wall of the Abbey ruins. I’ve worked wet into wet to blend the purple shadow colors with the warm local colors of the Abbey wall, which gives me a nice mixture of golds, browns and muted violets.

At this point I am ready to dig in to the rest of the landscape and get that canvas covered. To keep the flow going, I try not to be “stingy with my paint“. For this painting I’m using a somewhat more expanded palette than I do when I paint on location. 

I  want to have large enough puddles of the colors I see so that I don’t have stop every five seconds to mix up more paint. This process is pretty organic so it’s difficult to give a step by step process of mixing colors. In addition to blending paint wet-into-wet on the canvas, I also tend to dip into various larger puddles to make new blends as I go along. The most important thing during this process is just to compare one color, one value to the others, constantly asking myself, “Darker or lighter? Warmer or Cooler?”

I also decide to indicate the basic iris colors so that I know where I’m at. I have to be careful here–even the middle value of the purple/blue flowers has a lot of white in it, so  I really don’t want to paint these too thickly or it will be hard to control the darks, making them muddy and less pure. A lot of these preliminary iris lay-ins will need to be restated, and, of course defined, but I felt like I wanted some indication of them in there at this point so I wouldn’t get lost (if that makes any sense!)

Here you can see that I’ve continued on working my way down the canvas so that eventually everything is pretty well laid in. I’ve held off putting down much of my strongest highlights. That will be among my next steps, along with further refining, defining, tweaking, and adjusting.   

Up to this point I have used just a few brushes. Aside from the one round I used for the linear drawing of my composition in the earliest stages, I’ve used my larger flats and filberts. Being the very messy painter that I am, I can’t tell you the size numbers of any of these, as there is old smeared paint on all of my handles, completely obscuring any info that once was printed on them! I think probably  the smallest in use is around an 8 or 10(flat) but the ones I used the most were the largest filberts I have, with widths ranging from 1 and 1/4″ to 1 and 3/4″. I love these large filberts, as you get a nice thin edge at the tip and a broad flat side too, making them very versatile for my purposes. I could even stand to go to a larger size brush for this size painting, but I need to conserve my expenses so I’m trying to use what I have on hand right now.  Even so, if I use the broad side of the brushes I can get a pretty broad and loose stroke and avoid getting too fussy with too many details too early!

To be continued…

Jennifer Young; Vibrant Landscapes
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Now that my gardens are right outside my studio doors, I’m finding it far too easy to get distracted with gardening instead of painting–especially now that spring is here. I did do some more work on the painting of the garden passage in St. Cirq Lapopie started earlier in the week though, so I thought I’d continue to post the progression. It’s almost there, but I will probably do a bit more work on it before it’s all said and done :

I’ve learned something from the last few oils I’ve done and I’ll share it in case it may be of help to other painters. As odd as it seems, I am finding it is actually easier to manipulate the paint and have better effects with my edges if I use a lot more of it. I’ve never considered myself to be terribly stingy with paint to begin with, (and it may not be all that obvious in this picture,) but lately I’ve been laying it on pretty thickly and it’s like, “Wow, that makes things so much easier!”

When I’ve taught workshops, I’ve definitely noticed a certain “stinginess” in beginning painters, both in terms of the amount of the paint colors they’ll mix up on their palette, and in the application of the paint onto the canvas. This usually stems from just being uncertain, tentative, and maybe even a little intimidated. But what I try to get across is that in alla prima painting,  they are actually creating a lot more work for themselves by mixing up flat little puddles of paint and using skinny, dabby little strokes.

There is a caveat, though (isn’t there always when it comes to any kind of painting “rules”?) It helps to have a certain amount of confidence in your drawing and compositional skills if you’re going to lay it on thickly (and in fact, this may be part of what’s going on with beginners who are feeling tentative and intimidated). Otherwise when painting thickly, you may find yourself needing to do more scraping to make significant changes.

But over all for the kind of direct painting I’m doing, using a lot more paint is helping me to actually have better control AND keep it looser at the same time (if that makes any sense.) Manipulating thicker paint to soften edges and refine shapes does require a light touch though. You aren’t moving it around to such an extent that you’re smearing it or picking up too much of the underneath and surrounding paint layers. If you do that, there’s a danger of having a mud-fest on your hands.

Jennifer Young; Vibrant Landscapes
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