5,184 square inches of painting

A Bigger Gorge

I finished the painting last night, after some rework on the foreground and the strip of sky. Haven't heard back from the client yet but there's nothing more I want to do to it. I don't think I could make it better without repainting large portions of it. It is what it is, and I'm willing to accept it as such.

I certainly do still want to paint a lot more pictures of the gorge, try different painting styles, different colors, and also different seasons, different angles and lighting, like doing more portraits of the same person; try to capture more moods, more facets of their personality. But I need to switch to other subjects for a while. A lot of other things are starting to pile up in my head and I need to get them out.

The most difficult aspects were all related to it being so big, and painting it in such a flat, semi-abstract style, minimizing texture in favor of colors. As I was working out the final selection of hues and values in the river and foreground, I decided to keep them simple, not to let them pull the eye away from the predominant focus on the far end of the river and the hills around it. I spent several days thinking that choice through and decided it was the right one for this work.

The PBS series American Masters profiled Tyrus Wong last weekend, whose landscapes combine traditional Chinese themes mixed with a simplified style and non-traditional colors. They quoted him as saying that large amounts of detail are childish, and what the painting should show is the painter's enthusiasm for the scene. I found his paintings dramatic, evocative, and very beautiful, and that coupled with my decades of admiration for the works of Georgia O'Keeffe helped me settle on simplicity. I'm not saying it's the right approach for everyone, or for every subject, but when it works, it's great.

The only real surprise was that it took about three times more paint than I thought it would. I'm really glad I tackled it. My greatest fear was that I was going to damage one of the panels carrying it back and forth to the living room for photos, and when I accidentally brushed them with my shoe just walking around the studio. So far they're all in good shape. I just have to glaze them now—I did buy an extra jar of glaze—and that will take several days for all of them. I would varnish them except I have no experience with varnish, and I'm not using these for guinea pigs.

What a difference the brush makes

I finally got all the hills looking pretty much the way I want them to, and moved into the finishing touches stage on all three panels, and for the last week I've been working on the clouds. I saw two problems with them, the first being that the clouds in #3 really didn't add anything to the composition. Panel #3, the right-most end, isn't the focal center of the painting anyway, but I didn't want it to be just an add-on, I needed it to have something in it that would catch the eye and be interesting to look at. Otherwise, why have it? Since the cloud area is where I have the most freedom to improvise, I decided to add an interesting cloud pattern that would draw the eye out all the way to the edge if one happened to be looking at that side of the painting.

Once I got that roughed in I went through all the panels, adding more color detail in the clouds—more colors, more combining colors by glazing the predominant tones by layering each over the others—purple over orange, yellow over orange, and orange over purple and yellow. This doesn't really show up in the photo, but in person it makes the colors look richer and a lot more varied. You can paint in subtle color shifts with a thin glaze that support the 3-D look of shapes. I was using my large flat and bright brushes, a couple different kinds but all with synthetic hairs. The ones I used are fairly soft as brushes go, but I couldn't keep from getting the paint on unevenly and leaving more surface texture than I really wanted in the finer areas. I was getting more frustrated by that because I knew I've gotten a smoother look in many previous paintings, and that's what I want in this painting—a minimum of visible brushstrokes and a maximum of smooth shapes and edges.

Then a few days ago without thinking why, I picked up a different brush, a large filbert Winsor & Newton Eclipse series, which is made of fitch hair, or "black sable". I have a few of them I bought years ago, they're actually for oils, but they work great with acrylics and I've used small ones in a number of landscapes to paint leaves. As soon as I started painting with it I knew this was the answer I was looking for. Fitch hairs are so much softer than synthetic fibers, I can make beautiful unbroken, consistent washes of even thinned-out paint, and because they hold so much paint it's easy to get a nice smooth edge line, or a more smoothly-graded wash. In addition, the softness makes it easier to work wet-over-damp without disturbing the layer beneath, which saves a lot of standing around and thumb-twiddling waiting for a brushstroke to dry.

I looked over the web to see if I could find an even bigger Winsor & Newton fitch brush, and probably because they come from real animals they're quite pricey, not as bad as sable but way more expensive than the White Wonder or Softgrip brushes I use a lot of. I also found none of the big discount sellers even have the #14 I have, and W & N themselves were out of stock on anything that big or bigger. So I looked on Blick again and they do have their own line of fitches, including larger brushes, at a considerable savings over the W & N ones.

Figuring out what the painting wants

I finally got the color I want on the last big hill. It took me three tries over three days. My first guess was too dark and I thought it was too blue. The second time I made it lighter and more gray, and that looked good value-wise, but the color just looked like it didn't fit. I puzzled over it last night, and finally decided to take it back to blue, but a warmer blue, almost matching the rear hill on the left side, so mostly pthalo, with a smaller fraction of cobalt. The other thing I did with this pass was reduce the range of values, giving it more aerial perspective by lowering contrast.

I think the reason it took me so long to get a color that looked good was, again, because I'm really inventing these colors—they only resemble the colors in the photo references I have; and those photos, which were taken in different seasons even, as well as different times of day, are all different from each other. It was too big of a leap for my brain to consolidate all that varied information in one pass—I had to circle around it for a while before I realized I was trying too hard to copy the colors from the photos instead of doing what the painting needs. Last night after I finally marked up a photo with these colors, I saw the symmetry I got by having the rear hills on both sides being almost the same hues.

The white lines are there because you can't cover up blue with Pyrole Orange without a LOT of impasto.

If I still like it tomorrow, then I'm done with the hills. Or mostly done. 😊

Almost 92º outside at 3:30pm. At least we had a nice cool night last night.

Working out the level of detail

I think the left-most (north side) hills are 95% done. Earlier in the week I started painting in the deciduous trees at the base of the middle hill, and took it to a level of detail that really seemed too much for the rest of the painting. I was afraid the overall scene would get lost in that much detail. I know that's the opposite of my main worry when I started (would there be enough detail to be interesting), but there you go. Anyway, I simplified it and darkened it, and I'm stopping work on that section for now. I may refine it more later...or not. I may end up wanting to put a lot more drama in the clouds.

Last night I roughed in the foreground across all three panels, so today I'm starting the 2nd pass on the south side hills. Only five weeks left to finish it!

Discovering a new love of painting

I'm trying to figure out why I'm enjoying working big so much. I've noticed that I'm not worrying about the outcome anywhere near as much as I used to. I think the sketching helped with that, but it also occurs to me that having to work with something so much bigger than I am, where I can only fit a small portion of it at a time in my field of view, maybe I have to trust that what I'm doing is going to fit in.

It's only about 30% done, time-wise, but it's going in the right direction. I've got almost all the shapes defined. I just want a little more shape definition on the north side (left side.)

I think there's something else going on that may be more personal—probably everyone wouldn't feel this way, but when I load up my big brush and step up to the canvas and apply the paint with a big stroke, it just feels like the most natural thing on earth. It feels like I've been doing it for centuries, and I'll keep doing it as long as I possibly can. It's not like I'm any good at it yet—I'm still doing a lot of repainting. But it feels like I've finally—finally—found something that totally belongs to me, and it's not a thing—it's a movement, it's a dance with color and form. It's even better than having a really good gardening day. It's like being myself in the most clear and unfettered way I know.

I love how it fills my visual space with color while I'm working on it—I really do like being surrounded by colors. But now that it's looking more like actual landforms, it's almost like looking out a big picture window at something 'real'. Glazing over this underpainting is what I'll be doing for the next several weeks.

Almost to the fun part

I've been making slow progress on the painting, and have almost finished the underpainting. After getting the more detailed photos I wanted, I'm tweaking the shapes of the bluffs on both sides of the river—and taking a lot more time than I thought I would need to do it. But I've started putting in some shape details and playing with colors a little on both the land and the clouds, which is fun doing this big.

I finally rearranged the easel setup so I can see the tv in my studio while I paint. I'm so used to watching dvds or streaming while I'm painting, I was really missing it.

It's going to be really hot here for the next week and a half, to hot to do anything outside besides water, so I should get a lot done.

I need more paint

Three and a half days of work later, I'm still working on the underpainting. I emptied another partial tube of paint—my cobalt green. I had just placed another order with Blick two days before, so I had to switch to a different green, permanent green light, and adjust the mix appropriately so it's good enough for now. I really underestimated how much additional paint I would need for this. And this is just the underpainting! Who knows how much more I'll need for the glazing!

Other than that, it's going well. I'm getting more detailed photos of the hills to work with, and once those get drawn in, I'll be able to start playing with more hues and layers of glazing.

I would say at this point that being able to work across two canvases at once is pretty much a requirement, for efficiency if nothing else, and especially when you have a design that requires continuity of line across those seams.

The whole three yards

I was sitting in the living room staring unconsciously at my sofa when I realized that its length and poufy cushion makes it possible for me line up the canvases out here so I can see them all together, and from more than three feet away. The only way I can see them lined up in the studio is to stand to one side and use a fresnel lens:

Obviously not a great solution.

So! On we go. For the first two days I couldn't help spending time saying to myself, "What was I thinking?", even as it was taking shape. I would stand looking at just two panels together and think, that is huge! But being right up there next to it, with those intense colors filling my field of view, mixing big globs of paint and brushing it on with large, bold strokes—it feels great!

I have to take my 40% coupon to Michael's this morning and get more purple and diarylide yellow paint, but right now I'm just excited to see it all together. And, very, very happy that I can see it all together.

Making room for a big canvas

The first day of work on the painting I put each canvas up on my regular easel one at a time and blocked in the top band of purple. When I finished that and lined them up, I saw that even with the drawing, there was a big difference on the sides of the #1-#2 seam. I knew then that I really needed to work on two at a time.

So today I moved my regular easel out to the garage and brought the rack back in, and set it up in the studio in the only place there's room. I set up a table on either side, and used the counter behind me to hold everything else.

Once I got a workable setup and started putting on the paint, it became fun. I'm really going through paint as I block in the basic shapes. I wish I could put all three up, but there just isn't enough room, in my 13'x15' converted-garage hobby room/studio.

A Bigger Gorge

I'm following in the steps of David Hockney and Robert Burridge and taking on my first ever multiple-canvas painting—and it's a big one. A triptych 4' high by 9' wide—three 36x48 canvases. I've done singles that size, even a 36x60 once, but this is a whole new level of largeness for me. It's going to make this studio feel pretty small, I'm thinking.

The design that my client chose is my little gorge sunrise sketch I did in May:

Since the design has so many lines that continue across two of the canvases, I have to have some way to line up at least two at a time for the drawing, the color matching, and the finishing touches—hmmm, that's about 80% of the painting time—so I'll be pressing my folding show rack into service. I was very happy to find out that it's plenty big enough to hold two.

I'll be blogging this all the way to its hang-up in a North Portland office building! I'm guessing it'll take me 2-3 months to finish. I think the biggest challenge is going to be to create enough texture and color detail to make it interesting at that size when the design is so simple. That may not be a problem at all, but it's the thing I'm most concerned about right now. Well, that and getting around in my studio while it's in here. I had to do some clean-up, some clear-out, and move one chair out to the garage,  but that's not bad. I've always wanted to paint big, so here's my chance to find out if I do like it!

And when I'm done, it'll be Autumn!

Painting sun and fog

Foggy Sunrise

We get a lot of foggy mornings in the winter, and once in a while there'll be just the right amount of low-level fog to make the woods look foggy but the sun can still come up above it. We had one of those mornings a couple of weeks ago and I happened to see it, and it was calm enough so I went out with my camera and got some photos.

Once I got the trees and foreground blocked in on this, it took me at least five passes to get the light right. I probably repainted the whole thing three times. I think that's just how far off I was in my head about how to get the effect of bright light in a dark garden—repeatedly, the ferns were too big, too bright, too colorful, too attention-grabbing. I kept thinking I had it right, and then I'd look at it for a little while and see that I really didn't have it.

Yesterday I got it really close, and I spent more time last night scrutinizing it, and decided that it needed more darkening. So this morning, still fearful that I was going to have to repaint the whole thing again, I started blacking out more of the foreground, and darkening almost all the fern foliage until it finally—finally—blended into the whole composition and let the sun dominate the painting. Whew!

Leonardo da Vinci reportedly said, "Paintings are never finished, only abandoned." I'm abandoning this one, quickly, while I can get away, and pretend that I won this battle.

Celebrating the sun

The Sun Rises In The West

Week before last, I felt a painting wanting to come out in between gardening sessions, so on a damp day I sat down in front of a blank sheet of paper. I freshened my liquid acrylics, which had been sitting there for quite a while, and started just making graphic strokes. When I had some lines down I felt really good and happy about it, but couldn't figure out why because it looked awkward, uneven and inexplicable. I did like the colors though, so I kept playing with it, overpainting and eventually drawing shapes on it. After another day it took on the feel of a sunrise. I still was really having fun with it, and I realized it made something in my mind feel really good about the combination of well-defined simple shapes and the rough texture of the layering of the thin paints. I came up against a wall after that, but it was warming up so I went back to work in the garden and let it sit for a few more days. Today, after two long days of weeding, I wanted to work on it again, and ended up finishing.

I think it owes a lot to the time I spent looking at Richard Diebenkorn's work last year, but it also seems linked to the at-long-last arrival of temperatures hitting 70, and having the sun be out when I got up in the morning.

I took my car in for an oil change this week and the manager said "We're going to have summer from July 28th to August 4th." Well, I'll be ready.