Drat!
 

Now I am going to have to work harder and it's Summer and the veranda and a chilled Chardonnay are beckoning!

You have managed to successfully pull off a tricky composition. The weight of the stripes on the left balance the figure beautifully. Her skin tones are luscious!

Just lovely Linda!

Kim, be sure you're wearing a mask if you're sanding, especially on those big sheets of ABS. Who is going to cut them for you?

It's taken me over a year of trial and error (lots of error) to figure out how to work on ABS. All of my useful knowledge comes from Bill Whitaker who surely deserves an award for patience with student pests.

Lately I've been saving my Maroger for the top couple of paint layers and using it as a dip for my small brush to blend soft turning edges. The bottom layers are as soft as I can make them and I blend them flat and loose with a fan brush. I build up the lights with opaque paint and scrub the dark shadows into the ABS ground. I'm not thinning the paint at all (other than the initial drawing with raw umber) and there is a ton of paint on this panel.

Sanding (by hand!) between paint coats seems to act as an exfoliant for future layers and somehow increases luminosity. When you hit these ABS paintings with a halogen spotlight they explode off the wall. I think it has to do with the hardness and the brilliance of the white ground. My next few paintings are going to be on gessoed boards and I'm wondering if I can get them to behave the same way as ABS does.

Sharon, Thanks so much, and your post is reminding me to tell you that my efforts to draw on ABS were a big flop. No matter how much I spray or varnish I can still rub off some of the charcoal or Nupastel, so I will still need to frame them under glass. I'm thinking now, though, that I may try to sand the drawings by hand before I revarnish and see what happens.

Jeez Linda!

I must say you look like a tres chic lady in your self portrait and in your photo. However after you describe your working methods; sanding, sanding and varnishing and sanding, you MUST look a lot like me after a day of spraying and coating a 35lb pastel panel.

Let us say, we must both look like Pigpen in Charlie Brown, and as happy as two pigs in ****!

Thank you for all that useful information Linda!

I sanded the one panel with an electric sander the spouse brought home and it had a little bag attached that caught all the dust - it worked really well. He will cut them for me...you know...when he has time.

The one thing that caught me off-guard is that you use the Maroger only in parts. I had this impression it changed the suface - made it shinier and if only used in parts it would be different textures. This is good to know. I hadn't opened mine yet since I am in the middle of a painting, but now I might. The kind I ordered is pre-mixed and a thick gel. (from studioproducts, I believe that is what you & Bill recommended).

If I can get Jamie to cut the panels I am going to do the next one on ABS. I have a beautiful little model posing for me at the local wine vineyard tomorrow. Grape vines, an old-world-looking (hopefully) outfit, vines and vines and a basket of grapes. I am excited!

Thank you again - you are always very generous with your knowledge and it is appreciated!

Linda


This portrait is so excellent that I just have to stop lurking to say so.
I cannot stare at it enough.

Have you previously shared what your palette was?
I'd love to know, as I've been a pastel painter for so long, I'm having trouble translating my color knowledge over to oils. I've always just grabbed my favorite pastels.... no idea of what colors they were.


Cheryl

Hi Linda

Please add me to the list of admirers! This painting is fabulous - so beautifullly painted , and so beautifully composed. I hope you get much work from it. Thanks for sharing it. Wow just a great job....

Linda

Hi Cheryl,

Welcome to the Forum! I'm very flattered that you posted such kind words about my painting. I don't think of myself as a colorist and so I'm not sure you should follow my advice with your first foray into oils. I think my paintings all look pretty much the same no matter what colors I use, so there is some emotional/subconcious editing process that is taking place somewhere along the line. I don't try to match photos, for example; I'm always asking myself, does this color make the subject look alive? The second question I ask is, will this color make the viewer want to touch the painting? I'm always trying to get people to want to touch my paintings and if color will help in that process, I'll use it.

Isn't this the most non-intellectual approach to color that you've ever encountered?

So here's the palette for this painting - for me, it's pretty subdued:

Flake White
Yellow Ochre
Naples Yellow Deep (Old Holland)
Transparent Earth Red (Gamblin)
Irgazine Ruby (Ozog, no longer made by this company but now being made by Studio Products; see this post: http://forum.portraitartist.com/showthread.php?t=4680 )
Cerulean Blue Chromium (I love this for indoor flesh)
Ultramarine Blue
Permanent Sap Green
Raw Umber
Asphalutm (Gamblin)
Portland Grey Mediun (Gamblin)
Ivory Black

Linda,

Thank you so much for posting such kind words, and how come we haven't seen your work on the Forum lately?

I'll be posting some paintings within the next month and hopefully will have more time to contribute to the board this fall. This summer has been busy and unfortunately, filled with stuff other than painting. I did complete 5 paintings, but haven't had the time to get them photographed. Thanks for asking !

Thanks Linda!


I'll try one with those colors and see how it works out.
It won't be my first oil. I just haven't yet done any that are equal to my pastels (in my opinion.)

But I get requests for oils frequently, so I do need to improve with this medium.

I'm learning a lot from this forum and glad I finally decided to join it.

:)


Cheryl