Painting Away the Blues

It has been 3 weeks since I posted anything.  I enjoyed a bit of summer slow down when we finally had a week of 90's here in the Northwest, which slows most folks. Hillsboro's art center sponsored a 2 day plein air workshop, with Elio Camacho, a fine painter form the Bay area. It was part of their Plein Air paint out event on Saturday July 17th. So I painted on location 3 days and even tried using oils for 2 paintings. As as studio painter it was very much a challenge. Elio is a very knowledgeable, generous  teacher, an excellent colorist and a painting fool who slathers on the paint with creamy thickness. I enjoyed learning more about color, color  temperature and his loose style of realism.                                                      

Elio's demo on day one.

   An evening 24x36 demo about 90 minutes in.

He waited for the last light to finish it and add the dramatic light. Sorry but I failed to get a shot of the finished painting.

As a change of pace here is a diptych on my easel that is almost finished

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Kinds of Blue 40x60 Acrylic Mixed Media on Canvas

Thanks for looking and let me know what you think.

Color Notes

I have a few more thoughts on my palette and some of the colors of paint used. I usually have two of each primary. In the Munsell color system that is Red Yellow Green Blue and Purple. The reason for two of each is to have a warm and cool of each color/hue. Most of us recognize that colors have a temperature component and we think of reds and yellows as warmer than blues and greens. Our language references it when we say "something is red hot". Blue or green hues can be warmer if they have some red or yellow in them and are perceived to be cooler when they are not in the mixes. In real life all colors/hues are evaluated by the colors next to and around them. By using this knowledge an artist can create the illusion of depth in a painting or enhance a mood or emotion in a less representational painting.
Currently I use cadmium yellow light and medium, cadmium red light, alizarin crimson or quinacridone red, ultramarine blue and phthalo blue(red shade) viridian or medium green, and dioxazine purple, plus white and black. I use several earth colors sienna, yellow ocher, transparent yellow iron oxide and transparent red iron oxide.

Night Bottles 2
Wine Tasting
Thanks for reading, please let me know what you think and feel free to email me any questions.
Bruce

Color Choices

Sorry for my laxness in posting. Being lazy by nature, new to the routine and add in my favorite meal of the year and I have a host of excuses to choose from. (As a good friend is fond of saying "God grant me my excuses with out which I am nothing")
On to the subject of color and how I attempt to use it when I paint and abstract or most any subject. At the top of this post is picture of kind of color wheel I use based on the Munsell color notation system, many artists better than I use these ideas and write about them. The main difference from the 3 primary color wheel of grade school fame Red , Yellow, and Blue is the addition of 2 more primary colors, Green and Purple. This results in more accurate color compliments ( ie, colors opposite each other on the wheel). This system is used by science and industry to precisely describe a color and reproduce it.
Robert Burridge adapted this system to the paints made by Holbein but you can use any brand of paint to create your own color wheel. Between each of the five evenly spaced primaries are the five secondaries ie yellow-green or blue-green,etc.. This model lets the artist start with 10 colors of paint(hue) plus white and black and in theory mix any color she ever needs.
In practice a painting has more impact if there is a dominate color/hue for each painting, the red painting the green painting. Once you pick the dominate color its opposite or compliment is the strongest color choice for using as the center of interest. and as Burridge calls them your spice colors, are on either side of the compliment with one color between them. This gives you 4 colors to paint with,plus black and white.
By limiting your palette the odds of creating a stronger painting are improved and your mind is freer to concentrate on the one million other choices needed to build a picture.
Here is a sample of how I used some of these concepts in a painting I plan to use for my Christmas card. Enjoy the sneak preview.


Ornaments '08
12x12
Acrylic on canvas panel

I was thinking red and green to represent the Christmas season and red is the dominant hue, green it the compliment The center of interest is the ornaments In Munsell a blue green is the compliment of a red and my center ornament leans toward that hue.

Thanks for your patience as I learn the blogging world and let me know what you think.