The Bachelor

 The apples keep getting better. The video is terrible-I’m too busy painting! The series would have been four but I would like to keep going. Student grade acrylic works well as a ground if cut 1/4 into gesso. I picked up a quantity on sale not really knowing how I would use it. At first I thought them useless as they are shiny and transparent. The Bachelor was made with regular heavy body acrylics whereas triplex was Golden Open acrylic, which are both transparent and precious feeling. Small tubes, perhaps?

Triplex

 How do you like these apples? This one is done at home using two lamps. The plate colours are dark and intense. I like where this is going, and aim to make a set of four with dwelling related titles. The 6x6 format is great for my skill development.

Acrylic Apples: Quarters

 What a difference light makes. Today I’m working without lamps and a bay window at my back, with barely enough overcast daylight to get shadow, highlight and reflection. My regular acrylic palette has  burnt umber, phthalo blue, alizarin, cad red, Arylide yellow medium, pale lemon and Titanium white.

Compare these two-such a small adjustment stroke to the background made such a difference in spatial dimension.

High Park Hillside Garden

 

My friend Ileen and I stole a couple of quiet hours in High Park today, to do some oil painting. We found a spot next to a bridge that had been chained off for no apparent reason. the changing light made me quit after about an hour and a half, so as not to blend too much trying to accommodate the light. I want nice chunks of paint colour to rest where they’re placed, to make a kind of colour poem. The red underpainting peeking through helps pull it all together. Ileen pointed out that Tom Thompson used red underpainting, and I googled who invented it- Titian?


Check out Ileen’s painting! @ileensart