Thursday, August 1, 2013

How To Do An Under-painting in Oil

The Magic of an Under-painting.

 

 The Arrangement Snapshot


There are many benefits of doing an "under-painting"  in oil or acrylic works.  Some artists do their under-painting in acrylics and then do the final painting in oils. 

An Under-painting offers these advantages:

1.    A quick and relaxed way to cover the entire canvas with colour allowing the artist a wonderful opportunity to balance the colours, density and colour harmony.  Artists call this "killing the white."

2.    Thinking time.... time to see how the mental image will work and to think thru a variety of possibilities without loading the canvas with layers of trial and error experiments.

3.    A real confidence booster.  The under-painting is done with just a few basic colours.  Most of the time the under-painting has a brilliance or spontaneity that is fresh and unencumbered with the look of too much labor.  Yes, our over-worked and fretful brush strokes tell on us!!

4.    The best benefit of the under-painting is that the quick and easy strokes painted in this step actually become part of the final work. 


There are times when you will not want to do an under-painting, but if there is any doubt 
about what you want the final painting to look like, 
an under-painting is wonderful! 

Canvas: "Masonite" or hardboard
Size: 11 x 14"
Brush used in the under-painting:  sable flat about 1/2" wide


 Here is the under-painting for my new still life.  You can see thru the thin coats of paint and still see the pencil sketch except in the area of the background which is not an under-painting, but considered finished.
Note: The dark dots above the pottery jug are the centers of my yellow daisies to come.


 The little green apples are painted in sap mixed with Liquin Original to make it dry quickly and to thin it down.  I added a touch of red to the sap for the shadow side of each apple.


In the next step,  I cleaned my soft sable 1/2" flat brush in turp and brushed over the areas of the apples where the light was hitting them.  The "lifted" paint made the apples look 3 dimensional.  For fun, I mixed a very thin Cadmium Yellow Light with Liquin Original and lightly touched the areas of each apple where the light was the brightest. 

Without fretting or getting "detail fussy," the painting is taking shape ...quickly. 
                                                   I am enjoying the whole process.




The under-painting is a wonderful learning process for the artist to learn from the subject what works best, what should not be over-worked and best of all, how little real effort can go into a totally enjoyable painting experience.

Live to learn... Learn to live

In the next edition of this blog I hope to do a series of photos so you can understand shadows better. 
I will call it   "The Anatomy of a Shadow" 


Thank you to everyone who is following my blog.   Let me know if you have a special request or questions. 
I hope your art experience can grow and bring you hours of pleasure.  To make this process grow even faster... share what you have learned with someone.  The blessings are endless!

donna peters

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