An Oil Demo

Girl with Flowers
10x8" on paper

A very cute native Alaskan from Barrow. I already tried Nupastels on canvas which didn't work very well. Now I have a whole new approach.

What I have in mind is similar to the Mische Technique used by Brigid Marlin and explained at her website.

In Paintshop Pro I convert the image to grayscale and make it much lighter. I print it out 10x8" on the Epson 2200 which uses archival inks and watercolor paper. Then I mount it on a 1/4" Masonite panel with Elmer's acid-free spray adhesive.

Isn't this cheating? Don't real artists have to start with a blank white canvas? In my defense I cite Vermeer who made use of the latest technology of his day. With a forerunner of the camera he traced his picture on the canvas much as many painters today trace their image with a projected slide. Perhaps I'm taking it one step further. My position is it's not so much how you did it, but how it turned out..

With that out of the way...here we go. I begin by mixing Cad. Red with an equal amount of Alkyd medium and glaze the entire surface with a brush. Right away it is clear I should have sized the paper. It is staining and taking the glaze unevenly.

Unfortunate, but I proceed anyway.

Here I've mixed white and medium to scumble and model most areas. The red still shows through except on parts of the petals. You also see the start of the yellow glaze, middle left. Cad. Yellow mixed with a little white to make a veil effect.

The yellow glaze is done. I've put yellow everywhere, some places more than others.

Now I've reestablished the lighter areas with white again. And glazed with Cerulean Blue and a bit of white with medium. Also glazed the shadows on the face and arms with more red.

Here I've lightened the sky at the horizon with white and a touch of Yellow Ochre. Brought the sky into the flowers on her head and glazed that with blue. The hair is glazed with Ivory Black, a bit of red and medium. The eyes are glazed with that color as is the mouth and a hint just under the nostrils. It's done, but this photo is not the best. Tomorrow I'll use the big camera in sunlight.

Much better photo. Comparing with the original photo I've added width on both sides, simplified the sky, background, shirt and flowers and added mountains on the right side.

Generally happy with this experiment. Saved time in the layout phase, but still had to paint the entire picture. The original gray toned print is completely covered by several layers of paint. Next time I would use just black and white like an ink drawing.

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