lessons 9 & 10


this is the stage i reached with my pink lady. there are quite a few problems with it. too much white paint for one thing. also i tend to lack in patience sometimes and dive in with a final colour instead of using more layers - therefore not allowing the light of the background through and not allowing the painting to 'breath'.

i didnt want to continue with it and so today continued with the next lesson.

first, a drawing of the still life - two peppers. to work out composition on the paper.

then a tonal study using only black and white paint.

and finally colour - but each time we took some paint from the pallette we only painted one stroke before taking more paint - building up the paiting in this way. it felt good to finish all three works in one session - the energy flowed from one to the other (with a short coffee break in the middle of course!)

here is the finished painting from the previous post.. i showed it to my teacher and he pointed out the amount of detail which i am aware of and would really like to avoid more. there are more problems with it but i have learnt a lot from doing it.

8 comments:

Handmade in Israel said...

Wow! You are being super hard on yourself, Julie! Your pieces look wonderful to me, though it's great to learn and have a teacher to advise you. I love the black and white tonal study of the peppers.

Ursula Achten said...

Great what you're doing here, Julie.
I think, one important thing for the lady painting as for nearly every painting is, that at a certain point you'll have to step away from the basic photo and don't look at it any more.
There's only the painting left...

Anonymous said...

Ah, the slow building of layers on top of dry layers. Yes, that is something I struggled with when I painted, too. Building things slowly, I found I was impulsive and desired immediate results.

Seeing this post of yours, Julie, makes me long to pick up the brush. Maybe. Maybe.

Thinking of you and your family. Visuals from Israel fill the papers and t.v. news... g xo

P.S. Thanks for your sweet words recently left on my blog. You are a dear.

Wishing you peace and light.

KELLY said...

i am still blown away by how your work's moving on each post julie! seeing the pink lady has once again brought me a smile...she is great. sometimes like you say though it's best to just step away and move on to something else. i hope you'll go back to her. weekend hugs. take good care xxxx

Anastasia said...

sounds like you're enjoying your classes - love the bottom finished painting! its looks great Julie!

Cecilia Levy said...

It's wonderful to see your work in progress, thanks for sharing Julie! I love your buildings especially, they have a rare and special quality.

Anonymous said...

I love the idea of using b&w paint, colours so often used in pencil medium only. Your coloured peppers are gorgeous, patience is also something I have difficulty with ;)

ElizT said...

What's wrong with the detail! I love it.