Daily Painting Practice - Painting Rembrandt's Shelf

 More progress on the Rembrandt's Shelf painting. (My official painting title manager/wife hasn't approved the name. So this is a temporary title)
I like playing with shadows. I think they add interest and to some degree a sense of place.

 Bringing up the color intensity and working on the pipe. at this point I am feeling more and more like I will need something in the bottom left side.

I raised the level of the foreground, it seems to work better. Not sure about the match...(in fact my progress checker/wife says it looks "goofy". That's an official registered critique.
The glass ink well is back. Other than relocating the match I think it is close to the "almost" final phase.(clean up and detail)

Daily Painting Practice - painting faster doesn't mean painting looser

I think I have finally crossed an "it's all in your mind" barrier that I have been struggling with for a while. (we artists have  many of these, it's a hazard of the job).   This one  was the thought form I call -  I  can't  produce good work  quickly enough to  feed  multiple galleries.
Sounds  simple  to  solve,  but again, this is an artist's mind we are  dealing with, and nothing is more insecure , with the possible exception of a 3 year old's... after moving into a new house.

Anyway, first the good news. My gallery called to say that a couple of  paintings  sold. yeah! ( the small marigolds) and I need to replace them , they also reminded me  that they would like to have  another painting similar to one that sold in the past. I need to get this done this week. Yikes! ....
 In the past   I have  always  had the thought  that a quick painting meant a loose painting. Now  I realize ( don't laugh at how simple the solution sounds ) that if I  paint smarter or more deliberately accurate earlier I can produce the quality I  want  in a more efficient manner.
Duhhhh.
I never said I was a  fast learner!

Day one: come up with the idea and set up the still life.
 I thought I would show the set up  from a  different angle. It  takes a lot of the glamor away doesn't it?  Note the  tuna can  propping up the  picture frame.

Still Day one: I started on a rigid panel that I had previously added a second layer of toned gesso. I  mixed some acrylic paint into the white gesso and got this  muted purple color. I prefer to work on a pre-toned surface. Can you guess who the painting in the frame will be?

 Day two: Start scrumbling in  color. Scrumbling is  using  very dry color on a stiff brush,. Think of coloring  lightly with crayons only using paints.

 End of Day Two: Things starting to  come  together. Notice I  took the glass ink well  out. It helps to do the background first.  Instead of trying to  paint around the glass, pull the lights out of the background. I also started another  painting of mums....can't help myself.

 Oh, also  on Day One: I had to paint a color sketch for the set-up.  I researched the Rembrandt  painting on-line. I  have 3 books  with the same  painting and guess what? In each one the color is different. Makes you  want to see the original doesn't it?
 Below are three images  I pulled from the web.  I will use a little artistic license and choose the color and tone  that I like.

That's all for now... I've got o get back to work.

Daily painting practice - the long journey - completing a painting of mums

click on the image to  enlarge the painting

Mum Mum Mia

24"x36"

oil on canvas

Well, here is the final. Completed just in time to enter the Salon International  Competition. ( today is the last day to enter)
Painting this has been quite a journey.  Here are all of the progress photos again, for those of you too lazy to go back through the older blog posts.

It all started with a trip to Mary's house and her lovely flower beds.

 I had planned on doing a lot of individual  still life paintings but my  still life arranger/wife  suggested this.   So I  did a color study.
(I guess she was rrr rrrrrr ...right)

There were many more steps than these photos show.  (some backwards)   Some steps were on top of  others and redone several times. But over all  I am pleased with the result. Remember, it's all about  the  process ....(I can  say that now that it is over and I am breathing again) . Time for tea!