...keeps on slipping

ahhh well.

I have continued a bit further on the portraits (as you can see, below), and I think that they are coming along nicely...




...though, it seems, my brief foray into landscapes has crashed before it has even taken flight... I suspect my issue was that I was trying to rush. I have succeeded to some degree in slowing my thinking and being more patient with the work, as that seems necessary with oils, aside from this one issue. It has met with the hand of mighty Zeus wielding a brush full of gesso!

So in order to spare us all horrors unimaginable, I won't post any progress pics of that one. As a matter of fact I did not take any photographs of it; consider yourselves lucky! ;)

In an attempt to redeem myself, I have begun a couple interior paintings. I am, among other things, endeavoring to learn how to better render an environment. In much of my earlier work the focus is so strictly on the figure/subject that the environment/setting is an after-thought... IF there is one at all!

Not only that, but I think that oils are a much nicer medium to work in for what may otherwise be mundane subject matter... you can't really convey color with graphite ;)

Here are 2 stages of one of the interior environments. This is actually the corner of my bedroom.




I will post up the other interior (which is of a staircase) during my next update... hopefully within the next few days. Until then, "may your blade (not) chip and shatter", and as Morbo says "may death come quickly to your enemies.

Comments

  1. Not too bad for a guy who hasn't squeezed out a tube of oil in more than ten years. Do you still have that easel that I (cough) procured for you all those years ago?

    A couple of helpful tips if I may....

    When you do your initial drawing, use charcoal if you can. Graphite pencil washes away very easily and in the areas that it doesn't, it will definitely come back up through the paint. The same goes for ballpoint pens. That's what I used to employ but the formula for the disposable bic pen must have changed which I learned to disastrous results. Besides, when charcoal is used , you can use a watercolor brush and some water and lay in general tonal values. India ink is ok too.

    Since you are just learning don't worry about color all that much at first. Get yourself some titanium white and ivory black and make yourself a gray scale.

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  2. the interior is actually the first of any of these paintings where I even bothered doing a drawing underneath! the others I just sketched it with a light wash of turp&paint (must be the watercolor talking). I figured it would be easier to keep the lines for the proportions in the walls/door/etc... but I quickly noticed what you mention about the graphite coming back up.

    Like I said, though... it's a learning experience! ;)

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