Out of Shape

I try to paint every day.  Outdoors as much as I can.  Keeps me fresh.  Ends up about 50 - 50.

The last week I haven't picked up a brush.  For me the first thing I lose is the feel of the paint going on.  Then I lose the sense of what is and my sense of what I know (things like the sky is blue, snow is white etc.) takes over.  I knew that shows, delivering paintings, hanging, leaves, grass, eaves troughs and so forth were about to take over.  The usual suspects for the Book of Excuses.  Then I get a sense that unless I can dedicate a good block of morning time, I can't get started.  However, I have found that keeping my head in the game helps a lot.  I have stretched canvases, prepared canvases and boards, sketched some variations of some ideas, talked to some artists, read some blogs, and bought a few tubes of paint.  Like I needed them!

Through all of this the feeling of needing to paint big has emerged again.  I seem to go in cycles.  To do this I'll switch to the old french easel for outside (16x20 to 24x30 usually) and use the large canvases I have stretched and prepared for the studio easels.  I guess this is all in preparation for the winter painting season - but this week it is seriously warm.  So we have made preparations to attack Bob's barn on Friday.  It has taken 2 years to get Bob ready for this.  Should be fun.  And this afternoon I'll get on the easel for a few hours.

Bob's Barn, Summer 2009

The old girl has changed a lot since then.  Last fall a western blew off most of her one wall.  Today she is so adorned with character it makes for a difficult painting.

Recent Experiments

The lab has always been an interesting place for me.  In painting and in the support areas I am continually trying new things.  Its called development.  Recently I have been working on different grounds.  Even the best gesso I can find leaves a surface that is quite absorbent.  Since I like to paint wet in wet, I don't particularly like that.  Moving the paint around is defeated by such a surface.  In addition, the paint is sucked in at varying rates leaving a blotchy surface.  This happens during a painting session.  If you wait, the condition can be rectified with varnish or, in the case of continuing to paint - oiling in.  But waiting causes loss in immediacy.

In an attempt to change all that I did some research.  A Lead White ground apparently fixes all that.  To avoid the Lead I found a number of alternates and I have tried them on birch board and on canvas.  The oil paint sits on top of the canvas making paint manipulation possible.  That is you can take your brush and scrape up a mislaid stroke and place it in the right spot.

The painting looks as you painted it like this finished version shown before in a series of steps.  Varnish is then for protection.  I used no medium for this painting save for the beginning wash.

Bushwork, 12x12 Oil on Gallery Canvas

Here are the trial materials and the results.  The highest cost material is first.  I have been preparing the canvas to a semi smooth surface.  No sanding on the final coat.

Gamblin Oil Painting Ground - beautiful to paint on, slippery - slow dry, thick so one or two coats 

Grumbacher MG White - beautiful to paint on, slippery, medium time to dry, thick, one or two coats

Stevenson Oil Ground - nice to paint on, less slippery - slow dry, thin, three or more coats

Benjamin Moore Alkyd outdoor primer - nice to paint on, fairly slippery, quick dry, two or three coats 

Zinseel Outdoor Oil Primer (Alkyd) - nice to paint on, quick dry, less slippery, thin, three or more coats

Slow dry means up to a week or more...

Quick dry means less than a day.....

Slippery means the paint can be moved around at will....

If you try a commercial alkyd primer, make sure it is oil based, not shellac.  Make sure it is outdoor use.

All of these products are oil based, not acrylic.  The bond with oil paint is superior.  They contain natural or man made resins so they have varying degrees of odour.  I do my canvas and board prep outside in the garage - a problem as we get to the freezing point.  Clean up is not as easy as with Gesso.  For me the results are far superior.  You can buy canvas from people such as Fredrix with lead white prime.  Same goes for prepared panels.

Happy painting.

Was it Sleet or Snow?

We were painting at a horse farm the other day and the wind blew in some pellets of white stuff.  But it was 3 degrees and sunny for the most part.  Yup the light violet pellets were cold and melted on the palette.  So you just know the most beautiful painting season is coming.  The tree structure is out there in plain view now.  The fields are ready for their winter coat, adding deeper russets golds and violets as they wait.

I had to do it.  From memory and some field sketches from Georgian Bay the following image came along.

New Steeps, 12x12, Oil on Gallery Canvas

Snow is an interesting study.  It is full of colour - never white.  Here I used cad yellow lemon and manganese violet for the main colour actors.  Bits of viridian, cad orange, and cobalt blue also found their way into the scene.  Dealing with shadows, glancing sun, bumps, and full sunlight with a myriad of colours in the sky is the challenge.  Get ready, its coming!

Painting stages from a Wash

This painting was done from imagination and on site memory reference obtained late this fall.  It was done wet in wet and began with a transparent wash.  The wash colour was basically left overs from some experiments I have been doing.  More on them later.

Wash and Wipe

The wash was applied with a lot of mineral spirits so it flowed, dripped, and sagged.  You can see that there was really 3 basic masses.  To make a place for light some paint was wiped away with a rag or a brush.  Some of the darks were indicated with the same paint without adding more medium.  Just indications.

Some Darks, Other Hints

Using the same brush ( a #12 bristle Bright was used throughout) the darks were indicated with cooler colours.  This tells the viewer about the temperature of the light (warm).  A few hints of light were added and the first greys.  The masses were defined a bit to indicate the lay of the land.  Still very wet.  Edges relatively soft but can be changed easily in the wet.  No hint of leaves etc.

Greys and Colour Temperature

Continued wet with greys and adjustments to the light.  A lot of the previously indicated elements were obliterated and the edges got softer.

Continuation

More of the same.  Preparing for considerable painting to come.  Edges, values, colour temperature, a few detail indications, hilites and accents to follow.

Face the Wall

At this stage I decided to turn the painting to the wall.  A fresh eye might suggest some changes before it gets signed.

Level 8 Easel

I have never had a commercial easel in my studio.  I have made 4, and all but the first one are in use.  In the studio a French easel from plein air and 3 DIYs  are in constant use.  Since I started on a borrowed French easel, I have come to like my palette right in front of me between the canvas and me.  This keeps me further from the canvas helping with the discipline of avoiding a pencil grip and drawing practices such as "licking".  The location is great for mixing.  This easel was very inexpensive.  It has manual adjustments, up and down and angle of attack.  It is at a good height for standing while painting but can be lowered for a sitting approach.  It will take small canvases (6x8) and moderately large (48x72 or more).  Really large go on my garage easel.

Level 8 Easel

Here is the construction technique.  The table was rescued from a dark corner of my parents basement.  Many memories there.  Stripped it and glued it back together.  The drawer works.  A little musty.  Tubes don't seem to mind.  The rest is scrap wood.  1x2s and 1x3s form the H frame that is screwed on to a piece across the back of the table using small hinges.  The single leg at the back is also hinged.  Up the standing outer legs of the H are a set of 3/4" holes.  Dowel pins fit the holes and provide up and down adjustment.  A piece of scrap hardwood flooring goes across the dowels and the painting sits on a tongue of the hardwood.  I treated myself to a piece of baltic birch ply wood for the palette.  It sits on the table top.  It was treated with two rubbed coats of linseed oil.  It is cleaned after each painting session.  The can for medium is an empty Tuna tin.  Works great.

So how does the easel get its level 8 rating?  On the Ruby Rouge scale of 10 for the perfect easel, this easel does not have an automatic mechanism for raising and lowering (I drive a standard), it has no clamp on the upper edge to hold the top of the canvas (I don't have GPS) and it doesn't look pretty.  It just works.

Pre Painting Thinking

We recently took at trip to the far north east reaches of Muskoka.  Feels more like Haliburton, but you turn the other way.  The group had the full gamut of experience.  So I chose a simple 4 shape image to do a demonstration.  It was early morning - well, not too early.  I had one of the participants tell me what colour wash to start with.  This gave them the comfort in knowing that there is no magic in that choice.  It was a manganese violet.  I decided that I would paint direct to keep the process simple.  I used the violet to mass in the shapes in their relative values.  The scene was right before me so it was easy to point out squinted features.  The next step was to add local and light affected colour to the masses.  All the edges were very soft at this point and no detail was even inferred.  I then showed how to break up the masses with other equal valued tones.  The unbalanced image received a few blobs to help rebalance.  Finally a sharp edge and some hi lites and accents.

Doe Lake Demo, 10x12, Oil on Board

Everyone nodded and raced off to create their own paintings.  Many had been used to painting one image for months and were quite enthused about the immediateness.  All had some difficulty painting what was there as opposed to what they expected to be there.  A few caught on to the idea of creating the scene and installing their design concept.  The ever changing plein air gave everyone a challenge.  Some tried a big brush and before the weekend was out , a few got the hang of it.

New Brushes, Nothing Like It

Yesterday it was time for a treat.  New brushes.  Four new bristle flats.  Although I did break out a $3 #12 a while ago in my plein air kit, these were four good Manets (French) that I am using in the studio.  Under controlled conditions I could really pay attention to them.  Beautiful!

#6 through #14, All Hogs

You have to understand that I have never thrown a brush out.  I even have a #1 with no bristles left on it.  You never know when you'll need that specially worn ragged brush.  Sometimes the older and more ragged the better.

The new brushes feel great.  Suddenly you have (or think you have) control.  They do precisely what you want.  Crisp edges, chunk patterns, corners, sides, ends, all distinct.

How long do they last?  It depends.  For me painting on canvas 50% of the time just about daily, it doesn't take long to break a new brush in and then relegate it to the "used" coffee can.  I keep a separate set in my plein air bag.  For a #6 that takes about 3 weeks, a #8, maybe 4 weeks, a #10 5 weeks, and a #14 2 months.  I use the large brush a great deal along with a similarly sized long filbert.  The smaller brushes fill in as required.  The #6 I use to draw when the painting is complex to deviate from massing in.  Lots of brushes.  I pick up a few each time I hit an art supply store carrying the makes I prefer.  It is great to have a set or two in reserve just to perk you up.

I like the flats and long filberts for a few reasons.  First, they hold a good load of paint.  The longer bristles are conducive to calligraphic strokes.  They wear down to brights and short filberts which are good for shovelling paint.  I like both Escoda and Manet filberts.