That is Edwin Dickinson's phrase
For a description of some painters' palettes,
When you begin painting with a full palette, put ALL of your colors out, not just the ones you think you will need. Arrange them around the edge of your palette in a logical order, and use the same order each time you paint. You don't want to have to search for the right color, you want to know exactly where it is.
Oil paint is expensive, but it is important to use a sufficient quantity of paint when you are mixing a color. You can't make a painting from turp and fumes.
Do not use student grade paint (Winton, anything with the word HUE in the name): If you can, upgrade to a better quality paint. The color in your paintings will benefit greatly. The chalk and filler in cheap paint will never give you the rich color you can achieve with quality paint.
Use brushes that are at least 3/4 inch wide. BIG BRUSHES, SMALL PAINTING SUPPORTS will mean you will have to simplify. That is what we are after this semester.
Use brushes that are at least 3/4 inch wide. BIG BRUSHES, SMALL PAINTING SUPPORTS will mean you will have to simplify. That is what we are after this semester.
RULES
Here are suggestions I am going to call rules. Try them for one semester.
Rule #1
Mix paint on your palette with a palette knife. Do not mix with your brush. Get a large palette knife, with a blade at least 4" long. It should have a bend in it right near the handle. Every semester, I see painters make huge leaps in the complexity and richness of color when they take this simple and essential suggestion. After this semester is over, you can mix with a brush all you want, but I suspect you won't, once you discover how your color will improve when you use a knife.
Rule #2
NEVER DARKEN A COLOR BY ADDING BLACK OR BROWN. Take black and brown (earth colors) off your palette. If you are painting an object that has a shadow side and a lit side, do not mix the lit-side color then add something dark. Mix the dark side as a separate color, not from the lighter color.
Rule # 3
Squint at your subject. This will reduce all of the complexity before your eyes into simple shapes and VALUES. Seeing and translating this basic information is what we are after this semester. If you get the shapes and values right, that is almost all you need to create a convincing illusion in paint of what you are looking at. If these values are wrong, no amount of detail will make the painting live. I don't care how skilled or bad you are at rendering detail. I am encouraging the search for relative values, and at the same time the correct placement of the major shapes and angles. That is the only kind of drawing skill that matters in this class.
Rule #4
Chromatic grays and browns. Never use brown paint to make brown. Never use black and white paint to make gray. Browns and grays should be mixed using complementary colors to "knock each other down." Try these complementary combinations, and vary the proportions to get warmer, cooler or more neutral.
- cadmium red plus any green
- cerulean or ultramarine blue plus cadmium red light or cadmium orange
- any yellow plus any violet
If you need black, mix it. Try using alizarin crimson and viridian, or alizarin and courbet green to start. You can alter the temperature of the black you mix by changing the proportions of the colors you mix with. Experiment with adding other colors to the black you mix.
We live in a brown and gray world. Knowing how to make beautiful chromatic browns and grays can make your paintings so rich.
We live in a brown and gray world. Knowing how to make beautiful chromatic browns and grays can make your paintings so rich.
