A new food still life: Two Walnuts

Culinary art: a new food still life
A humble subject this week: I have started a food still life of two walnuts on a small Belle Arti wood panel (18x13cm). I’m not going to paint a ledge for them to sit on or a defined background, as I want people to focus on the beauty of the walnuts: all those creases and bumps and lumps. Strong light-dark contrasts will help focus too. I’m very much enjoying painting this very simple food still life.

As usual, at this stage I’m mapping out values and the composition in the underpainting (see picture). I usually use a value string of yellow ochre + mars black + titanium white, but this time I wanted to try a different mix: terre verte + mars black + titanium white. I’m using oils of my favourite brand, Old Holland. This greenish colour will give a better contrast with the brown glazes which will be painted on top. The picture doesn’t show this properly, but there is a green hint to this layer.
I’m leaving this layer to dry today. Tomorrow I’ll refine the details and then it’s on to the exciting glazing stage (although doing the underpainting is pretty exciting too. To me anyway).
This panel will be framed in a simple dark wooden frame. The plan is to include it in my upcoming exhibition at French restaurant RetroBistrot in Teddington.

The finished painting:

 

                                                                        

September 2013 by Dutchoils
Categories: New paintings | Tags: culinary art, culinary painting, Dutch painting, food painting, oil painting, terre verte, underpainting, walnuts

A new Bird oil painting

It seems that oil paintings of birds sell well in the borough of Richmond Upon Thames. I recently sold a painting of a puffin and was asked to paint some more birds. So, off I go!

I have been taking photos of birds anywhere I can over the past few months. I now have a growing library of geese, chickens, sparrows, pigeons, robins, seagulls, etc. When I went through these two days ago I decided to paint a young sparrow.

A few thumbnails and then a quick sketch on the linen canvas I'm going to use gave me enough of an idea what I want this painting to be like, so I got the paints out to start work on the underpainting. This method is part of a classical way of working when painting in oils. I'm using my usual verdacchio mix of yellow ochre, mars black and titanium white (Old Holland paint). This is now left to dry. In the next few sessions I'll further refine the bird and develop the background. I may restretch the linen to a smaller set of bars as well.

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