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. 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.

Fire and Water - Abstract painting

Acrylic colors used (Atelier and Matisse): 

Alizarin red, cadmium red medium, phtalo blue, ultramarine blue, Naple's yellow, cadmium yellow medium, titanium white 

Brushes:

A normal 2 inch house painting brush, brushes used to apply gesso, a painting knife

Methodology:

This was a very simple abstract I did recently on stretched canvas. I started by placing directly on the canvas ultramarine blue, alizarin and Naple's yellow. Using a 3 different brushes (one for each color) I started spreading the three colors on the canvas mainly at three distinct areas, blue at the bottom right corner, red the upper left and yellow the central to upper right corner. Carefully I started blending the colors together to create the secondaries i.e. green, purple and orange, leaving some areas of pure primary color. I left the colors to dry for couple of minutes  and then I started applying cad red, cad yellow and phtalo blue onto the previous layer using bold brush strokes and applying circling motion depending on how I was seeing the colors developing. I left untouched brush strokes that looked good to the eye or any secondary or tertiary colours that appeared by co-incidence. 

To finish off the painting I took a piece of tissue and placed it in titanium white and I applied it to some areas as a highlight. Using a painting knife I mixed blue, yellow and white and  I applied vertical strokes to the right bottom corner to look like reflections of color.

Hanging Rock

This is an oil painting of hanging rock in Blue Mountains National Park.

I used two sets of colours, pallette 1 for the background and pallette 2 for the foreground.

Pallette 1: Titanium White, Cobalt blue, permanent crimson, raw sienna, manganese blue.

Pallette 2: Pilbara red, ultramarine blue, burnt sienna, Payne's grey, cadmium yellow medium

Step 1

Step 1

First I did a basic sketch using willow charcoal. Using a very diluted mixture of colour in odourless spirit, the upper part of the sky was painted with manganese blue and titanium white. Raw sienna was used for the yellowish part of the sky. An underpainting of the background mountains was done using cobalt blue and white, adding more blue and permanent crimson as I moved forward.

Step 2

Step 2

I blocked the main rock using a wash of burnt sienna and Payne's grey for the darkest shadows. I left the painting to dry overnight.

Step 3

Step 3

During this stage I add more detail and mid-tone colours. Clouds where painted using a mix of cobalt blue and crimson with white. The background cliffs where painted using white with a touch of cobalt blue and permanent crimson for the furthest ones. As I moved forward I eliminated the blue and added more crimson and also a touch of burnt sienna to the closest cliffs. 

Grass on the furthest cliffs was painted using raw sienna, white and a touch of sap green. The trees become greener as they come closer. 

The main rock formation was further developed using ultramarine blue, burnt sienna and Payne's grey.

Trees on the rock formation were blocked using ultramarine blue/vermillion, tinting it with white as moving backwards.

Step 4:

Step 4

More details and highlighting were added. At this stage I usually start from the main subject and then move to the less important parts and background. Pilbara red, cad yellow and vermillion were used for the main rock, creating texture using a painting knife. Highlights on the rock were done using white and Australian red gold. I then added highlights to the trees using cadmium yellow and Australian red gold, adding white as I moved to the background.