The Art of Nature and the Nature of Art
  • Musings on Life and Work in Progress
  • Find my gallery
  • Contact Me Directly

Duck-Printing

11/9/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture"The Dying Swan Goes to a Wedding" 24 x 24 oil grisaille
True confession.  I wore orthopaedic shoes —brown Doc Martin’s, I guess —for what felt like forever.  Age seven to twelve, actually, at which point I refused to embarrass myself further.  My flat feet seemed to have been reshaped from duck prints to what my love calls "your Egyptian feet” — always ending with “I don’t know how they hold you up”).

But my feet are making duck prints again and my back stopped speaking to me at noon.  Yet again I am in deep water with no land in sight (although the duck feet might come in handy).  Turns out that “It seemed like a good idea at the time” is a dangerous way to choose subject matter.

Little girl in white dress.  What could possibly go wrong?

The fact that her skirt was tulle apparently registered enough for me to identify it in the last post.  I ADORE tulle.  If anybody ever gave me a ballet tutu I would probably never take it off.  Thousands of hints have failed to produce a tulle anything and thus I am reduced to painting it on others.

Loving it and painting it are different continents.  Today the charm of the tousled layers has come head to head with the sorting out of said layers. Cross-eyed trying to establish just how many tulle overskirts she is wearing and where they do and don’t overlap, I am driven by the grim truth  that, if I get it wrong, the painting won’t read right.    

So this means returning to first principles.  Yes, the glaze oil process as I practise it necessitates least five separate layers of paint.  And yes, that allows for corrected rendering at least four times.  But it has been my experience that getting the drawing right at the beginning makes the difference and that means paying close attention to detail and line at every stage.  Portraits are, of course, the most dependent on exact rendering.  (You will remember that my lapse of judgment chose to paint a portrait surrounded with tulle.)  I stood at the easel today for three hours and staggered through the drawing.

That propelled me into the grisaille, or value study, which establishes the tonal structure like a sepia-tone photograph.  Nothing slapdash here either.  I have learned the hard way that careless brushstrokes will return to haunt me.  So whether I am painting a leaf or a nose, I try to imagine the “grain” of the area and echo that with my brush.  Again, the damn tulle.  Four more hours for my arches to sink.

Our marriage has precious few secrets.  But I don’t remember anything in our vows which said I couldn’t keep a small dark chocolate stash for those late afternoon duck-print moments.







0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Archive

    July 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    October 2021
    July 2021
    March 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014

    Categories

    All
    ALLA PRIMA PAINTING
    ANIMALS
    ART SHOWS
    BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS
    CHRISTMAS
    COLOUR THEORY
    COMPOSITION
    GARDENING
    GLAZE OIL PAINTING
    HOW SHAPE MATTERS
    INSPIRATION
    OUTDOOR LIFE
    PALETTE
    PHOTOGRAPIC REFS
    PORTRAITS OF CHILDREN
    PORTRAITURE
    SEASONS
    STILL LIFE
    SUBJECT MATTER
    THE FUNCTION OF TITLES
    THE HUMAN COMEDY
    THE ISSUE OF SIZE
    THIS OLD HOUSE
    TREES
    UNDERPAINTING
    YouTubes

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.