Near Dusk - Sold

Near Dusk - 9" x 12" oil by Greg Newbold

Just got word that my little sunset painting entitled "Near Dusk" has sold at Williams Fine Art. This painting is my interpretation of what was a fleeting moment captured on a cell phone one winter evening. It is nice to always have a camera on hand (even a phone camera) since you never know when you might be inspired. This painting hung in my kitchen for quite a while, so it is a bit sad to see it go. I hope the new owners love it.

Demo At Williams FIne Art

Painting live at Williams Fine Art - Greg Newbold

Last Saturday evening the annual summer BBQ was held at Williams Fine Art. The gallery asked a few of the artists it represents to come and paint live for the patrons. Food was deliciously catered by The Red Iguana and after I had a nice plate of shrimp fajitas. I spent a couple of hours painting and talking with the patrons that wandered by my easel. I tried to treat it as much like painting en plein air as I could even though I was working from a photo.

Many visitors to the gallery commented on my photo. I had to admit that the photo is a montage of elements from at least three photos from the same location pieced together. I rarely work from a straight up photo, preferring instead to move , scale and adjust elements in Photoshop to arrive at a composition that I like.  It was fun to paint in front of a live albeit ever shifting audience. I had been itching to paint some more cows, so it was fun to get a good start on this one. I'll probably put in a couple more hours before I call it finished.

Head Painting Finale

Jackie- Oil on linen; 9" x 12" by Greg Newbold

Just finished up finals for summer term and I thought I would post the study I did on the last day of class. Once again I was using the Anders Zorn palette. This one took about an hour and a half. Sorry for the sporadic nature of posts lately. Things have been pretty crazy around here, but I hope to get the blog back on track soon, and with a shiny new Mac!

Steven

Steven - 1.5 hour life study - 9"x12"; oil

Here is another head study I did for my head painting class. This one took a little over an hour and a half and once again used the Anders Zorn palette that I described in a previous post. I premixed a number of hues and values with the three color palette Focusing on the "secondary" colors and hues and then went at the painting very directly. This model was painted under natural light and the subtle warms and cools were an interesting challenge. There are things I wish I had time to refine such as the eyes, but this was a fun exercise.

Bob Ross Rocks

Painter Bob Ross was an inspiration for thousands of aspiring artists  through his long running PBS show. Whether I liked his work or not ( I sometimes did) I admired his enthusiasm and encouraging manner. I also must give credit to him for building a huge TV audience as well as a multi-million dollar art supply empire that continues to this day, more than a decade after his untimely death from cancer in 1995. Bob Ross was only 52. PBS just released  an homage in video that celebrates his quirky methods and personality. I got a real kick out of the video- have a look. It makes me want a Bob Ross t-shirt for Christmas.

More Bob Ross on Wikipedia

Color Blocking Exercise

 

In my head painting class I had the students (and myself) undertake a color blocking exercise. The canvas was marked off in a grid of one inch squares. Rather than worry about the drawing of the head, the goal was to mix the average color and value for the zone that fell within each square of the grid. If you squint, you can see the face. I was surprised how much more I concentrated on creating the exact color and the painting took nearly as long as I usually spend on an actual head study. Once again the color palette was the Zorn palette of cad red light, yellow ochre, ivory black and white. This was definitely a hit as far as exercises go and several of the students have opted to do it on more than one day. If you have never done this, give it a shot.

Zorn Palette Exercise 2

Malaysia - Oil; 9" x 12" by Greg Newbold

A few posts back I talked a bit about the palette used by Anders Zorn. I explored this palette a bit more last week during class and was much more pleased with the result this time. I pushed the color further to see how much more range I could pull from the limited colors of Cadmium Red, Yellow Ochre, Ivory Black and White. It was also interesting to practice painting a more ethnic model. I focused on  premixing my colors a little more and putting the paint down very directly. I spent about an hour on this study as I have about a dozen students I am helping during the three hour class block. Even given the time restraint, I am pretty pleased with the result. The range of color continues to surprise me and I am looking forward to playing around with this limited palette more in the future.