Still Life in progress

Thanks to all of you who left such lovely comments on my last post about the TD Art Gallery Paint-In. I had planned to do an interactive painting station for the public to participate, but the weather didn't cooperate, so instead I did a painting give away. This is the grisaille I painted at the Paint-In .

Today I had a bit of time to paint, so I started adding the colour. I started the process by selecting objects and creating my still life. I set up the still life on a table my garden, trying a number possible arrangements, and finally settled on this one and photographed it. I often paint still lifes from life, but because I wanted to capture the feeling on sunshine on the set up I needed to work from a photograph to keep the light constant, as I knew I would be painting it in several sessions.




I realize that lately when I paint, I've been starting at the top of the painting and working my way down through the canvas as it prevents smudging, and as I move forward through space, I layer over the objects just painted. I'm just in a blocking in process at this point.



I now have the whole painting blocked in roughly and will start creating more form with adjustments to light and shadow, and will plan my edges and work on softening some, loosing some and sharpening others. I'll also start to add some details in the cloth etc. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have a bit of time to paint again.

Still Life in progress

Pear Hug

Original Oil on Linen  8 x 8  $95 

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Merry Christmas Everyone! I didn't have a Partridge in a Pear Tree so I decided to send a little love and do a Pear Hug. I'm having fun playing with these dark backgrounds, and edges. I liked how the pear on the right was almost completely in shadow. These were extremely red pears, giving it a bit of a Christmas feel. The wooden crate is one of my favorite props. It's a vintage pop crate - "Canada Dry". I'll have to try to get more of it into one of these paintings. Have a wonderful holiday season with your families. Talk to you soon!

Pear Hug

Keith Hiscock - Still Life Workshop

This first image is the first painting I did on day one of the workshop. It's not a great photograph because I ran outside and propped it on a wall to shoot it without a tripod etc, so I'd have something to show you. Below are shots from the day.

Keith Hiscock is a very well known Victoria artist. He paints beautiful landscapes and still life pieces. You can find him on Facebook.  This is Keith's quick sketch to place the positive objects in the still life set up. 

 He then switched to the negative space and blocked in a thin layer of a mixed black.

 Keith demonstrated switching back and forth between the positive and negative spaces, helping you to really see, and to start setting up a variety of edges. Hard crisp edges at the focal point and soft or lost edges as you move away from the focal point or blend into the background.

 Here's Kerry Fleetwood, an FCA friend, and a very talented artist, who I painted beside during most of the workshop. As you can see, Kerry was really picking up on everything that Keith was saying. Her paintings were beautiful!

 Artists hard at it. You could have heard a pin drop!

Here's Keith giving Kerry a few pointers.

I learned some great concepts during the weekend, that I feel over time, will make a big difference to my painting technique. Among the many pointers here are a few that particularly spoke to me, for improving my work:

• when developing the painting, switch back and forth from positive to negative space,  helping you to  form  shapes accurately and to really see. 
• I found that this push and pull between negative and positive  also allows you to paint back and forth over the edges of negative into positive and vice versa, rather than painting up to the edge of an object, helping to start making decisions on your edges as the painting is in progress.
• As my painting evolved and I had recorded on canvas the necessary information, Keith encouraged me to stop looking at the set up and focus on the canvas, making decisions as an artist, directing where the painting would go, rather than recording the image. I had all my values down and the placement and composition was where I wanted it, so I needed to stop looking at the set up. This point is going to have a big impact on my painting. I'm one of those who tend to overwork things.
• At this last stage is where I tried to really focus on edges. Sharp well formed edges at the focal point, soft and lost edges moving away from the focal point. In the case of the leaves in my painting up top, a few leaves were defined and the rest blurred at the edges so they started to disappear. This was really fun for me. I've only been painting in oils for about 6 months, so being able to play with the edges like that is quite exciting.

Keith Hiscock - Still Life Workshop