Tuesday, February 24, 2009

New Painting Started



Okay–started a new figure painting today and it feels good! This is the first one of Natalia from the drawing session last week. Some of you have asked for a few notes on my process and thinking. Here's a little: Laid in some underpainting with Prussian blue (I know–runs counter to the traditional earth color approach. I've begun the majority of the paintings from the last few years with blue) and then, after giving this a couple of hours to tack-up, I went in with my first pass of the "fairest" flesh color, valued up and down with a compressed range of about five values, pushing in some exaggerated warms and cools. Very little, if any medium with this round–just a touch of Cobalt dryer so all will be dry and ready when i get back to it for an initial glaze (pushing the values back, sort of "keying" my colors together, starting to establish the tone or atmosphere of the environment, and making ready for a second pass.)

16 comments:

  1. Awesome - thanks for the process details.

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  2. OH~! OH~! yeah,,goooood,,you are so good.... I will make 5 values skin colors for my painting..tomorrow.....(>__<)..he he.

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  3. Thanks for your explanation of your manner to paint !
    A very good painting in progress... of a good-looking brown lady, besides.

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  4. thanks so much for the in-progress post. so great to see how things evolve. really appreciate it.

    also, i like blues in underpaintings. usually gives the finished piece a nice airy quality like you see in a lot of jeffrey jones work.

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  5. Love the process shots Kent and I'm already really loving the piece at step 2. Nice work and hope you're doing great!

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  6. I love this already. Are your drawings contour or blind contour? Or am I totally off? Whatever it is, I admire the way your style has developed.

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  7. Killer inside scoop here. I just passed a colleague The Fountain graphic novel and the DVD. I feel like you have to study both for such an epic storyline.
    big fan

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  8. Good lord I am so happy just to see the work in progress.. Thank you for this! - am an aspiring painter and very much inspired by your body of work.

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  9. AWESOMEE! Thanks for the process shots and explanation and for the inspiration.

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  10. Thanks for the process shots and information. Since here you are going straight to flesh tones, I was wondering, do you ever paint over the underpainting with a middle tone for blocking in values? If not I'd love to know why.

    - Myron

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  11. I have loved your work for a long time. Thanks for showing the process. I was wondering are you painting this just from the sketch and your memory?

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  12. ivan: contour.

    myron: for the last number of years i've been going straight with the flesh tones over the white of the primed linen. when i talk about the "initial glaze" and/or "keying my color", i suppose this essentially does the same thing as laying in a middle value (if i understand you correctly), just at a different point.

    Anonymous: i usually transfer my drawing i did from life onto the canvas. Generally, if i hit upon a drawing that i think at the time as having the possibility for a painting, i'll photograph the model before he/she breaks the pose and use that along with my drawing.

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  13. Kent, thank you SOOO much for answering our requests on more info on your process. Have been enjoying IMMENSELLY this step by step, this is very exciting since theres no published material (images or text) about it. Please, DO more! I´ll be watching everything closelly!

    Thanks again!!

    Your friend
    ALEX SUNDER
    Brasil - São Paulo

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  14. Kent,

    First of all thanks for this space, for me can be very usefull.
    Do you use the color black? Do you use it occasionally? or instead of using the black color you use the dark blue (prusia)and / or some combination of purple to get to the very dark tones?

    Regards from the caribbean

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