White Pitcher with Tulips SOLD

9 x 12, oil on panel

After my little monochromatic studies last week, I decided to try a larger color painting. I painted this over two days, about 3-4 hours per day. The progression is below:

I started with a quick drawing. I spent an hour just doing a basic block-in with pencil on paper, to work out the composition and get the main proportions right. It's tempting to skip this step, but it saves so much time and struggle with the paint later on.

Next I tranferred the drawing to the panel. I use transfer paper, which is a tissue paper with a thin layer of graphite coating one side. I taped my panel to my table, taped a piece of tranfer over that with the graphite-side down, and then I taped down my drawing over it, pressing the corners to match up the drawing to the panel underneath. Then I traced the major lines of my drawing with a hard pencil.


After I transferred my drawing, I went over the faint graphite lines on the panel with a brown extra-fine sharpie. Some people use a quill pen and sepia ink. That's too much work for me, but I would like to find a lighter-colored sharpie.

This is my drawing taped below my panel. The drawing has a lot more detail, so I ended up taping it off to the right so I could see it while I worked on the underpainting.

This is the start of the underpainting using the wipeout method. I used mainly raw umber, with a little ultramarine blue and a little white mixed in. I used a Viva paper towel as a rag to wipe out the white areas. I love Viva paper towels, they are the best for painting - almost as strong as cloth and not many fibers.

More refined stage of the underpainting.


I started adding color. At this point I left the painting for another day.

The second day I just worked at refining my colors and getting more detail. The overall look at this stage was very impressionistic. I was trying not to blend very much, keep the brushtrokes visible. I tried to work from dark areas to light areas, mixing a lot of color into the midtones.

The final painting. I'd like to do just a drapery study sometime, it was really fun. The tulips were ideal flowers because they last a long time and don't change much over a few days. They stayed fresh because my studio is very cold. But as I worked with my space heater turned on, the flowers warmed up and opened. I have no idea how people paint flowers in detail... even stable ones like tulips move too much.

Finally, here's a picture of my current studio setup:

The large white panel at the top is a piece of foamcore I have hung from the ceiling, to block my still life setup from the skylight. The light from the skylight falls on my easel, but not on the still life.

I've lit the still life with my white light "daylight" lamp from the left side. I also tried clamping my palette to my easel, as you can see. I abandoned that after 1 day though, it was annoying. But I hate having one hand occupied holding my palette all the time.

One day I will find the perfect clamp that will hold my palette right where I want it....

Three Little Pitcher Studies

Pitcher Study I
5 x 5 inches, oil on panel

I spent a few days doing these little monochrome studies, to get the feel of the paint again. This was my first - the photo is a bit blurry, but the painting itself is pretty hazy, too. I was concentrating on keeping the paint nice and thin until the very end. I am also trying to leave my edges interesting, showing the layers and brushwork. I used raw umber, ultramarine blue, and white for all of these.

Pitcher Study II
8 x 8 inches, oil on panel

For the next one I started over with the same still life setup but on a larger panel. However I jumped in too fast and I got the paint too thick and I began to struggle with control. Also, this was my first drapery study in paint, and it was hard to work out the drawing aspect of it without doing a sketch first.

Pitcher Study III SOLD
5 x 5 inches, oil on panel

For my third try, I decided to go back to the smaller format and just take my time, go slow, and keep the paint thin as long as possible. I abandoned the drapery since I didn't want to take the time to do a sketch first.

This painting is not much to look at, it's tiny and brown and simple, so maybe no one else can tell what a huge step forward it is for me, but I am thrilled with it. Loose and precise are finding a happy balance here. I am not trying to make the paint do anything, I am letting it be paint.

Few Strokes. Light touch. Focus on the subject.

Few strokes.
Light touch.
Focus on the subject, not the painting.

These are the words I taped to my easel today. I have not touched a brush in 4 months - four months - so I needed to bring some guidance into the studio with me.

Those three points were things I have thought a lot about. The break from painting and the focus on drawing this past fall gave me time to get some distance and think about what I need to work on in the paintings.

Light touch
I have had an over-heavy hand. Especially when I start to get anxious about how the painting is going, I start to apply more and more pressure on the brush. Sargent told a student that the bristles of the brush should never touch the canvas, that there should always be a layer of paint between them.

Few strokes
Another thing I do is labor a painting. I put down paint in haste and spend stroke after stroke "correcting". I was so struck when I saw paintings by Seaton at Arcadia gallery in New York last summer. The reproductions don't show it well, but every mark is distinct. Nothing is blended, each stroke is left to be what it is. Too many brushstrokes in a painting ruin the painterly quality.

Focus on the subject
When a painting is going badly, I find myself looking at the painting a lot more than my subject. Juliette's painting workshop this summer taught me to spend a LOT of time looking at the subject. Slowing down and looking is a natural state for an artist - it's only when I get anxious and "in my head" that I only pay attention to the painting. Attention on the end result is disaster for a painting. A painting is only the evidence left behind after careful looking. I need to focus on the process, not the result.

Even with all this, I needed one more thing to take into the studio with me, one of my favorite quotes:

It is a tremendous act of violence to begin anything. I am not able to begin. I simply skip what should be the beginning.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

When I found this quote a few years ago I felt such relief to hear the poet capture how I feel about beginnings. It's not enough to say I am often afraid to begin... it actually does feel violent.

So I promised myself all I had to do was get into the studio and make a few monochromatic marks. I wouldn't even attempt color. Just get some paint on the canvas!

Armed with all this I stepped into my chilly little studio, turned on the space heater, and started prying the lids off jars and paint tubes stuck shut for months. I poked around for a while, tidying up, tuning my radio to the classical station, straightening all the still life objects on my shelves, tracking down the good roll of extra-sticky masking tape I keep losing. I found a million things to do but finally my gessoed panel was mounted, my still life set up, blobs of raw umber, ultramarine blue, and white were on my palette, and my favorite set of brushes laid out.

And really, I had a great time. I love to paint! The results aren't really worth posting, just a tiny brown painting of a pitcher, but I just loved feeling the paint again. And I think I made some of my best marks yet - a light touch is the way to go.

More soon!