Underpainting in complements: A Glow

[Rochelle Brown]

Just for fun I decided to try underpainting in reverse colors. The suit was red and the skin tones were light green. Painting the skin tones on top of the green created a great glowing effect. I also used mostly Old Holland paint including flake white and some of their incredible shades. The only medium used was linseed oil. I tried this after reading that Michelangelo used this technique with skin tones.

I'm not yet able to download but trying this may be very satisfactory.

[Michael Georges]

Rochelle,

Good for you! That is similar to what I do with my verdaccio underpainting. The warm flesh tones imposed on the cool green underpainting creates a vibrancy and glow.

[Renee Price]

I have done that with a few recent paintings and I have liked the results.

Renee Price

I've noticed that using green creates more glow too. I don't know why it does that tho, do any of you guys know why?

[Patt Legg]

Michael, for your verdaccio technique do you actually use some green in it or mix your own greens? Or does it just depend? I often use umber plus yellow ochre varying how much of each. Maybe add a little yellow lt.

I love your work and must admit that I have not started a portrait with the greenish underpainting. Is this actually a toned board with greenish hue? Or do you begin your painting with the greenish hue

Thanks in advance.

[Michael Georges]

Patt:

I learned the verdaccio method from Frank Covino. This underpainting method primarily concerns value and creating a monochromatic underpainting upon which you will impose color.

I use Mars Black, Flake White, and Chromium Oxide Green to make nine values of a gray-green color. In the past, I have painted it over a minutely detailed charcoal rendering, however, you could easily paint with verdaccio over a white or toned ground. You are actually rendering the form in the verdaccio values - I have several examples of it on my website.

Hope that helps and thanks for your kind words about my work!