Outdoor Figure Painting

Oil on linen panel, 12 x 16

This is my first ever outdoor figure painting. Can you believe it?! I painted this with my artist friend Abigail on my deck. Abigail has a lot of experience painting outdoor figures since she studied with John Ebersberger and at the Cape Cod School of Art. She's done many mud heads, figures on the beach, etc. She couldn't believe I had never painted a figure outdoors. But it's true. Somehow all my portraits and figures were done indoor with controlled lighting. But I'm liking the outdoor light with the cool reflected light on the model's face.

It was a cloudy day and made for an interesting study of the colors on the model's skin and kimono. But the sun kept going in and out of the clouds, making painting more difficult. It's a complete different painting when the sun came out! 

Kuniko is a wonderful model. She always arrives early, times herself, and holds the pose steadily. We are happy to have her working with us.

Figure Studies

 

Same model in both paintings. The first one was done in Zoll Studio, and the second one was done in the open studio of the Howard County Arts Council. I'll have to work more on the second painting in the second session. 

Reclining Nude

Reclining Nude, 12 x 16. Painted last night at Zoll Studio.

I have realized that when it comes to a good painting, composition is probably the single most important thing. Because in the end, all the great drawing, value plans and pretty colors won't save a bad composition -- if things are in the wrong place.

Also it really helps to look at great artists' works, if just to train your eyes to get used to a higher level of drawing, color harmony, and edge handling. And to calibrate your brainwaves to vibrate on a higher frequency, so to speak. 

Two Studies

Tuesday was a painting day.

 

Gisele, 14 x 11

 

Figure Study, 20 x 16

When I paint figures, I tend to elongate the form and the figures end up looking like super tall models in fashion illustrations (blame it on years of doodling fashion models on the margins of my notebooks in school). So this time I tried to correct that and went a bit too far in the other direction. The model looks short and stumpy. Oh well. Maybe next time I'll get the proportions right.