Assignment one continued

Using acrylics, I did quick colour sketches (in acrylic) on top of both the above grounds. 

Although the yellow did provide a very warm ground, I felt it was too bright for this subject, and would have to be toned down considerably to be used successfully – the bright yellow just dominated too much.

The second colour sketch on the raw umber/purple ground I felt was more successful in terms of providing a warm, indoor background colour to my painting although, again, the colour was a little strong.

I decided to work along the lines of the redder tones but to lighten it for my final painting.   I began mixing oils and testing them on a sheet of paper, and eventually decided upon a ground of crimson alizarin, raw sienna and cobalt violet which was heavily diluted with thinners and then applied to an A2 sheet of canvas paper with a rag to blend the colour in. 

I then drew the basic lines of the composition in light charcoal to avoid it showing through to the final painting.

In order to allow the background to show through to the final painting I used mainly transparent paint, using turps to thin.  This also had the benefit of drying quickly!

I used a light ochre wash to mark out the basic shapes and angles of the cupboards and then worked up from there, trying not to be too hung up on all the detail in the painting.  For the myriad books, I used muted colours and, in most cases, a single stroke with a flat brush.  I then used a cut up credit card as an implement to give the impression the writing on the spines.  The other objects on the shelves (ornaments, etc) I tried to complete with the minimum of brush strokes.  For the shadows, I mainly used dilute mixes of greys and browns (burnt umber and ultramarine mixed), again, to preserve the underneath layers of colour. 

I completed the painting in four sessions; the image below is after the second session – I worked from the top down to avoid smudging those areas already painted and, as mentioned previously, used fairly dilute transparent paint to help the speed of drying (photo taken in lamp light so more yellow than the actual). 

The chair was quite straightforward to do – I painted a base layer of sap green all over the chair and then used viridian, cadmium yellow and French ultramarine for the leather.  I did use a little white mixed with the viridian, but didn’t like the shade this created (too “pastelly”) so then used the cad yellow to lighten, which I think reflects the actual colour much better.  I began using black to darken the green but, again, found this too dull, so mainly used ultramarine (with just a hint of black) for the dark tones.   Painting the chair only took just over an hour as I tried not to show every detail, just getting the basics in. 

I then used a credit card to apply the colours to the floor – white, burnt umber and yellow ochre mixed loosely and then spread over to give the impression of floorboards.

The image below shows where I was after three sessions – only things left now to complete are:

-       final shadows on the cupboard

-       detail on the cupboard doors

-       stereo on the second shelf up

-       chair legs

-       shadow from the chair

-       chrome fire surround

-       yellow lamp on fireplace