Intro to Painting, Attempt #1

Here are my paintings from my first attempt of taking Intro to Painting: Still Life, when I was pregnant with Little Lady !  We prepared the canvases with a thinned out burnt sienna, and painted with the palette knife for most of the paintings.

(painted with a brush)

palette knife

those shadows really need to be lightened up!
palette knife

Here is the start of the painting from class the class I am taking now. I am repainting Monet's Meadow with Poplars.

Claude Monet, Meadows with Poplars

"blue print" sketch

first layer of paint; base color layout

Hue and Temperature

Yesterday we did a painting focused on hue and temperature. Hue refers to the color (red, blue, yellow, green, orange, violet), and temperature refers to if it cool (blue, green, violet) or warm (yellow, red, orange). The subject was "pure" white onions, or garlic sitting on white paper. I choose to paint two little onions sitting on the corner of the paper. The angle of the paper draws the viewer into the painting. The shallots had a yellow hue from the the light source. Even though the paper was white, it had a blue hue overall with some warm tones throughout it. Our main source of light was yellow with some natural light coming from a high window which gives us the mix temperatures on the paper.

painted September 19, 2012. Intro to Painting: Still Life. Fall 2012. UMD.

Warm and Cool Colors

So, I have decided to take an Intro to Painting:Still Life (ITP) course this fall.

We started with gradients of a limited palette: blue (ultramarine), red (burnt sienna), yellow (yellow ochre). Using those three colors, we mixed violet, green, and orange.

My first painting for class focused on finding the undertone of a specific color. For example, the white cup isn't a plain solid white, the shadows were a cool blue while the highlights were a warm yellow. Here is my painting, which was a one-day painting.

painted September 17, 2012. Intro to Painting: Still Life. Fall 2012. UMD.