[Patricia Joyce]

Ngaire,

I'll take a stab at it since I have taken one workshop with Marvin and will be back with him for two weeks in July. Forst, this is the complexion palette arrangment based on William McGregor Paxton's flesh tone color choices. The main colors in his palette for flesh tones are:
Flake White #2 (Michael Harding best brand for student)
Raw Umber
Ivory Black
Yellow Ochre and Yellow Ochre Pale
Terra Rosa
Indian Red
The brand I use are Window and Newton

What you are seeing on his palette is an arrangement of four rows
Grey string
Yellow String
Warm Red String
Cool Red String

Each string is mixed in nine values labeled from 9 to 1 (1 being the darkest- think of wattage in light bulbs, higher wattage is brighter color). To quote Marvin, "this palette is designed to achieve cleaner color notes with a purer hue. All colors are mixed within their own value row to avoid muddiness). I use thirty-six brushes four in each value and NEVER use the brush in one value or mix a color from one value to another, to keep your colors clean.

While this sounds cumbersome, once you have established the palette which takes less and less time to mix the more you do it, the easier it is to attain the chroma, hue, and values in your painting.

I would strongly recommend you visit Marvin's website (here through SOG) and email Marvin. He will most likely be happy to respond to your inquiry. I hesitate to explain the palette further since I am a novice myself.

Good luck. I believe you would find this very easy to work with, as it is designed to aid his students in New York and in his workshops.