Still Life Workshop

I participated in a workshop focusing on still life with Qiang Huang about a week ago. He is not only an artist but also a scientist which made him very sequential and analytical in his approach to painting. His results are painterly and lovely, but his process and thoughtfulness were quite precise. We did a rather traditional approach with a monochromatic underpainting and then the traditional lean to thick application of our oil paint. It was a fun four days. All of the students had their own still life set ups to work from. Qiang made observations and suggestions but never painted on our work, which can be an issue at times. He did some nice demo paintings. These are the paintings I completed. They are all 11x14 on stretched canvas, except the White Rose which is on an 8x10 gessoed board.

Painting the street

Finished this 24x24inch acrylic painting of a downtown street. I tried to keep as loose as possible on it...The yellow sky just seemed like the right color even though it was blue...

Painting the figure

Today painting the model was fun. It was one of those foreshortened poses. The arms and legs were tricky. I enjoyed some of my paint application. This is acrylic on gessoed paper.

Model with Flower

 

 

15x20 acrylic

This week's painting was a bit of a rush as I had to get to my Book Club lunch! Pity to have to go have fun, but someone has to. Anyway, one of our favorite models with a flower in her hair was the subject. The background is rather light and thin compared to some of my paintings from the model. I liked the fresher effect.

Reclining Figure Painting

Here's a recent acrylic painting of the model. I think those red brush strokes added at the end are my favorite part.

Painting at Dusk

This 24x48" Acrylic is of Camelback Mountain at dusk as seen from the freeway. It was challenging to depict the time of day which is when a bit of light is still in the sky, but lights are coming on. I had to try to keep it indistinct the way our eyes don't work in the evening, but yet add enough information. I used a painting knife for the second layer after the underpainting. I used color that I felt more than saw like that crazy green sky.

Wind Up Toy Painting

This little 12x12" acrylic is of an old wind up toy frog. It is marked that it is made in USA Occupied Germany so just after WWII no doubt. I had fun painting it. We had over a dozen wind up toys in a cardboard box that we kids played with. I am a frog lover so I hung on to this one. I sure would like to know where all the rest are!