Well, it’s been a while since I tended the blog and a while since I really got to paint. However, since then some important things have happened. I’ve graduated from student grade paints to artist grade. Funny thing is I thought I was already at artist grade although the word “academic” should have tipped me off, huh? I guess it’s the forest for the trees phenomenon. Anyway, getting artist grade paint has been a real delight and I’m looking forward to going forward with them. They just feel better and perform better in many ways. The color is more brilliant and alive. Great fun.
Now, since I last blogged, I’ve decided to do a couple of things with my painting. In the close up above, you can see some detail on the left part of the roof tiles. That was me playing with my new paints. But something was dissatisfying to me about the roofs. So, I went back to my reference material. Even though I thought I had carefully gridded and drawn in my components, somehow my roof lines had become whomper-jawed, as we said when I was a kid. When I looked at my reference material, I could see that the lines for both roofs always ran at the same angle. In my drawing and subsequent painting of the roof tiles, I had gotten them out of kilter and they looked cartoonish and cock-eyed.
I also saw where the depth of the roof didn’t stay consistent from the left to the right. As well, my walls on the left side of the bell tower weren’t truly vertical. So, I took a ruler and a T-square and drew in some white guidelines for the roofs and tiles. I also straightened up those walls on the left side. Now, I'll go back and redo the roof tiles to get them in the right place and make them uniform across the roof lines. With my new vertical guidelines, I'll have a more accurate wall.
You can also see that I’ve begun laying in some of the stones. I decided my best tack was to place all the stones before I began detailing any of them. So, I’ve just taken various shades of gray and begun laying them in. Since these are river stones and many of them are rounded, I’m using a couple of different sized filbert brushes. To paint around the openings in the belfries, I wanted to start my brush stroke in the opening of the belfry and paint to my right, since I’m right-handed. To most comfortably do this, it was easier to turn the canvas upside down to paint the left side of each belfry opening.
Ultimately, I'll have greenery in the form of trees and shrubs in the foreground but I’m going to paint the bell tower complete so that anything that shows through will be complete. This may take a little extra time than if I were to plan the trees ahead of time and then leave the area behind each tree unpainted. But I like to have a finished item in the painting and then I can place components in the foreground wherever I want without worrying about going back and finishing up something that I hadn’t planned to show through. Also, I just like painting the component completely at this point in my painting because it’s fun to see the finished item. I enjoy that part of the process.
I’ve heard other artists explain how they give their paintings life, so to speak, as they paint and I’m really having fun with that on this one. As I look at the reference material, I see different shaped stones and there’s even quite a variety of colors—blues, mauves, tans, beiges, whites, browns. As I’m underpainting the rocks, I try to imagine how it must have been while they were building this bell tower. I imagine how the stones must have felt in their hands. I notice that the stones near the bottom tend to be bigger than those higher up. I imagine how they picked out the stones down at the river. I guess they didn’t worry about any kind of pattern since the rocks were to be covered by the stucco. But what a surprise to see the beautiful pattern of rocks when the stucco wore away. I wonder if they wondered about people three centuries later enjoying their handiwork.
Now, since I last blogged, I’ve decided to do a couple of things with my painting. In the close up above, you can see some detail on the left part of the roof tiles. That was me playing with my new paints. But something was dissatisfying to me about the roofs. So, I went back to my reference material. Even though I thought I had carefully gridded and drawn in my components, somehow my roof lines had become whomper-jawed, as we said when I was a kid. When I looked at my reference material, I could see that the lines for both roofs always ran at the same angle. In my drawing and subsequent painting of the roof tiles, I had gotten them out of kilter and they looked cartoonish and cock-eyed.
I also saw where the depth of the roof didn’t stay consistent from the left to the right. As well, my walls on the left side of the bell tower weren’t truly vertical. So, I took a ruler and a T-square and drew in some white guidelines for the roofs and tiles. I also straightened up those walls on the left side. Now, I'll go back and redo the roof tiles to get them in the right place and make them uniform across the roof lines. With my new vertical guidelines, I'll have a more accurate wall.
You can also see that I’ve begun laying in some of the stones. I decided my best tack was to place all the stones before I began detailing any of them. So, I’ve just taken various shades of gray and begun laying them in. Since these are river stones and many of them are rounded, I’m using a couple of different sized filbert brushes. To paint around the openings in the belfries, I wanted to start my brush stroke in the opening of the belfry and paint to my right, since I’m right-handed. To most comfortably do this, it was easier to turn the canvas upside down to paint the left side of each belfry opening.
Ultimately, I'll have greenery in the form of trees and shrubs in the foreground but I’m going to paint the bell tower complete so that anything that shows through will be complete. This may take a little extra time than if I were to plan the trees ahead of time and then leave the area behind each tree unpainted. But I like to have a finished item in the painting and then I can place components in the foreground wherever I want without worrying about going back and finishing up something that I hadn’t planned to show through. Also, I just like painting the component completely at this point in my painting because it’s fun to see the finished item. I enjoy that part of the process.
I’ve heard other artists explain how they give their paintings life, so to speak, as they paint and I’m really having fun with that on this one. As I look at the reference material, I see different shaped stones and there’s even quite a variety of colors—blues, mauves, tans, beiges, whites, browns. As I’m underpainting the rocks, I try to imagine how it must have been while they were building this bell tower. I imagine how the stones must have felt in their hands. I notice that the stones near the bottom tend to be bigger than those higher up. I imagine how they picked out the stones down at the river. I guess they didn’t worry about any kind of pattern since the rocks were to be covered by the stucco. But what a surprise to see the beautiful pattern of rocks when the stucco wore away. I wonder if they wondered about people three centuries later enjoying their handiwork.
Happy trails 'til we meet again.
