The end of another day (acrylic painting)
I am going to demonstrate a different style of painting, this time painted in acrylics. One of the main differences between oils and acrylics is their drying time. Acrylics dry up by evaporation of water while oil colours react with the air in what is known as oxidation. The fast drying time of acrylics can be of a disadvantage but also of an advantage. It is an advantage if I want to paint several layers of very thin paint (glazing) without having to wait for a long time for the previous layer to dry up. Atelier Interactive acrylic paints are not only especially formulated to prolong their drying time but also they can be reworked after couple of hours if becoming wet again after the paint was already touch dry. This helps you to blend colors into each other in a way similar to oil colors.
The subject of this painting is a sunset and view over a typical Australian farmland. Painting sunsets is fun creating a lot of interesting colors in both sky and land. I decided to keep the colors as much as possible vibrant while making the best out of the complementary colors. Red, green, yellow and purple/violet are the main colors used in this painting.
Materials used:
- 101 x 50 cm stretched 10 oz cotton canvas
- Brushes: Normal 1 inch and 2 inch house painting brush, selection of medium and small flat Taklon brushes
- A selection of painting knives
- Color palette (Atelier Interactive Acrylics & Derivan Matisse):
Titanium white, Olive green, burnt sienna, raw sienna, Burnt Umber, brilliant violet, dioxazine purple, Payne's Grey, Pthalo green
Blues: French Ultramarine Blue, Pthalo Blue, Cobalt blue
Reds: permanent alizarin, Brilliant Magenta
Yellows: Naples Yellow, cadmium yellow light, cadmium yellow medium, cadmium orange, vermilion
Under-painting (Blocking in)
For this painting I decided to use a vertical canvas, unlike most landscape paintings. The horizon line was set to slightly above the middle part of the canvas. When painting sunsets, one needs to remember that the warmest colors are those around the light source, in this case the setting sun. The further we go away from the sun the cooler it will become. The easiest way to remember this is to look at the color wheel, take cadmium yellow light as the warmest color and just move anti-clockwise towards the purples and blues. This order needs to be followed when painting both sky and land.
The first layer of underpainting was done using a 2 inch house painting brush with not too thick but neither too thin layer of color. Cadmium yellow light was used for the area around the sun, followed by cadmium yellow medium, vermilion, permanent alizarin and ultramarine blue with the addition of alizarin at the top.
Starting from the most distant land mass using horizontal brush strokes and using a tint (with the addition of white) of brilliant violet plus some cobalt blue. As progressively as I advanced into the middle hills, I increased the amount of permanent alizarin, ultramarine blue and dioxazine purple. To the darkest part at the front I also added burnt umber with ultramarine blue.
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The next step was to start adding more detail and form to the sky and landscape. This time I wanted to apply a very thick layer of pigment and to do so I started adding pure color directly from the tube onto the canvas and mix the colors on the canvas itself. I also decreased the size of the flat taklon brush to 1 inch. The sun was painted using white and cadmium yellow light. In the same order of colors as used for the underpainting I started to add more pigment and moving the pigments into each other using the sides of the flat brush. I also started adding the next darker color into the lighter one to create the impression of clouds and shadows in the sky. Since the darkest upper part of the sky seemed to look like a dark cloud, I added brilliant magenta to underside of the cloud or the area where the sun hits.
I space in the cloud was opened to give the impression of broken clouds, by painting the sky with a mixture of Pthalo blue and white.
Lucky accidental brush strokes that gave the impression of clouds or the broken sun itself, played a significant role in the development of this sky.
Mid- and fore-ground
The next step was to start adding more detail to the land starting from just below where the sun is. Along the horizon line I started by adding cadmium orange followed by alizarin and magenta, especially to the central part underneath the sun.
The glow on the ground of the two fields in the middle ground (on the right) was painted with Naples yellow with touch of olive green. White was added to the more distant one.
The trees in shadow were painted using Payne's grey plus some cobalt blue to the distant ones or else with the addition of some Pthalo green to the closer ones.
Using a painting knife I painted the grass on the closest hill using a mixture of ultramarine blue, cadmium yellow medium, alizarin and red gold. Burnt sienna and burnt umber were also used for the ground at the front.
Finally I painted the sheep, blocking them with purple and highlighting them with Naples yellow, titanium white, alizarin and a touch of cadmium yellow/cadmium orange.
I find sunsets very inspirational due to their colors and drama, especially if the sky is cloudy. I named this painting "The end of another day", because I find that the time when the sun sets behind the horizon is also a time of reflection. When the sun sets marks the end of another day, meaning another day less from our journey of life on this planet. It is a time to think about the importance of time, since very day, minute and second that passes we cannot get it back. So it is very important that we use every second of our life wisely.
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