J Dunster Art Blog – Oil Painting, Portraits, and Cats
Figurative art, oil & acrylic painting, figure drawing, and cat portraits
I don’t quite know how to explain why I chose this subject. I liked the expression and thought it was dramatic and evocative, I guess.
There was a lot of time spent on the values, shadows, and some on the colors (which areas were cooler, what areas were warmer?). The expression of the man came together on its own; he seems at times to me to be merely intense, thoughtful—other times he seems angry and sinister. I’ll let the viewer decide!
This is a first for my blog, and I feel a bit geeky about it. I’m posting this from my studio! I have a nice computer set up here ($100 used Mac Mini–who says that these older computers are obsolete?) and have finally configured it to upload files to my site, scan and edit artwork in Photoshop, read photos from my digital camera, and the whole bit.
Anyway, back to the painting. I’ve fussed with this one for a few days and have to say I’ve very much enjoyed the process. The reference photo used had some lovely skin tones—warm and cool, subtle shifts in color, and a calm, and beautiful expression on the model’s face.
I’m also trying to paint a little more boldly and thickly, though I guess it’s not enough yet to be obvious in the painting itself.
I used a DickBlick linen panel for this painting. I haven’t used this brand of panel before, but I have to say I enjoyed it. There’s something about the texture of linen, and I’ve really warmed to it. This is one of the Blick’s “high end” line of panels, I assume meant to compete with brands like Fredrix’s archival linen panels. I like both brands and will pick whichever is on sale!
Back from a longish break (Colorado! I went to Colorado!). I did a fluffy cat painting the other day (need to create a blog entry about it) and tonight it is Señorita, a 10×10″ painting on panel.
This is another painting from my “novela” series (inspired by the Mexican soap operas, you can read more about it at the bottom of this post). I liked her expression—emotional, but not sad, beautiful, and slightly dramatic. And with lots of bright pastel colors!
I painted this on a 10×10 inch panel, with a textured acrylic primer (“gesso”). It’s an interesting texture that I’ve learned to like—it’s not always what I want, but sometimes it’s interesting to use it. The panel is thicker (around 1/2″ thick or maybe a bit less) with a dovetail slot (you can learn more about dovetail slots here). You can either hang the painting on the wall as-is (with the dovetail slot) or frame it like you would any other regular painting.
I’ve been absent from this blog for too long! That’s mostly because I’ve been busy migrating all my stuff to a new, bigger studio.
I have waaaay too much stuff, particularly art stuff, like panels, boards, paints, brushes, and other art STUFF. My previous studio, while very cozy, was too cramped for all my STUFF. One day I snapped and said, “This is it!” and decided to move to a new studio, which is far roomier.
But first, a new painting. “Male Profile,” again using my fave model, Jason Aaron Baca (photographer Portia Shao).
I tried to go with a looser feel in this portrait and think I like the direction I’m going. The palette was simple—I don’t think I technically used a Zorn Palette, but I did try to keep it limited. Really loving the limited palette these days.
Now onto the studio—it’s not huge, but so much bigger than my postage-stamp-sized previous studio. Not that I didn’t love that studio too (got a LOT of work done there!) but I was running out of room, fast. Something had to give! And this new studio can accommodate a computer & scanner, and even a little kitchenette of sorts (hot plate, dorm fridge, and so forth). Very conducive to getting a lot of work done, I hope!
This is just a small view of the studio, which still needs to have more STUFF schlepped in to it. I’m trying to be sure to protect the carpet from the oil paint, as you can see with the variety of rugs and so forth littering the floor!
The latest effort, only I’ve been picking at it and picking at it for a while now . . . I don’t know why some paintings are like that. There are the paintings that come together in a few hours, and then others that I have to revisit and fix this and fix that. Why why why? 😉
I liked the simple color scheme in this one (lots of black and grey) and the drama of the pose.
A very limited palette was used on this one. I maybe used some magenta or perm. alizarin crimson somewhere, but for the most part I tried to limit it to Zorn: White, Black, Vermillion (Cadmium Red Light), and Yellow Ochre. There wasn’t much need for many more colors than that.
I used an 8×10″ acrylic-primed panel from Dick Blick, it’s got a canvas-like texture which I kind of like!
I’m not sure exactly what’s going on with this one. I loved the drama (drama, drama, drama! 😀 ) of the expression and the pose. I tried to keep the brushstrokes loose, but sometimes that doesn’t always work out.
The panel was primed with an oil-based primer, which makes it so nice for wipeaway and texture, like you see in the background. I first covered the whole panel with a thin wash of a brown, which I then wiped away, keeping some of the color to stain the background and also to show the texture of the priming brushstrokes.
The expression is a bit ambiguous. Is she afraid, scared? I think she is indecisive, ready to make a decision and not sure which way she’ll go. But interpreting her expression is up to the viewer to decide.
This is a “put a fork in it, it is done” painting. I do like it, but I also think there comes a point where if you pick at something too much, you ruin it. I think I’ve reached that point.
I actually started this painting a few months ago, for a Valentine’s Day painting challenge (we had to do a painting with a “hidden heart” in it somewhere). I returned to tweak a few more things on it just a few days ago. And now I think it’s time to call it done, even though, as always, I see things that I would like to tweak some more. But there’s a limit, right? And it’s time to move on. Right? 😉
It does seem like I do a lot of paintings of Jason Aaron Baca. And I do! He is awesome. He’s a highly popular figure on DeviantArt.com, where he has a plethora of reference (“stock”) photos available for artists to use. I have been collecting these photos for a long time now and am on a roll, doing a series of paintings from some of them. I love the drama of some of the shots!
The painting is on 9×12″ linen panel, by Fredrix. It’s classified as “archival” (meaning it is durable and won’t fall apart before its time). Fredrix has archival boards available in linen as well as cotton, and the linen ones have the option of being primed with either acrylic or oil-based primer. This painting was primed with acrylic, if memory serves.
There’s something quite sublime about the texture of linen, I can’t describe it exactly, but I like it very much. I’ve stockpiled quite a few of these boards for future use.
I did some final tweaking to this painting and I think it’s done!
For some reason I had trouble with this; perhaps it’s still “not right,” but I believe in letting go eventually and moving on to the NEXT! So that’s what I will do with this.
Again I used a reference photo from Jason Aaron Baca (model) with photographer Portia Shao. I love his photos because there’s so much drama there. I love the drama! He’s so generous to make his stock photos available to artists.
With this pose there was a slight “searching” or “beseeching” expression on his face, which I enhanced. I did a few slight adjustments to his features (just to mix it up a little). I hope this will make for a somewhat arresting portrait.
Painted with oils on another Sourcetek (I think—or was it Raymar? I think it was Sourcetek) panel. I love the texture of these panels. I covered the entire panel with a thinned-down layer of Transparent Oxide Red, which I wiped away in some spots (to paint in the face and flesh tones) but I left much of the Oxide Red still there. I think it worked as the background.
Another painting done, and a couple others that haven’t been blogged about yet.
And yet again, I used one of my favorite photographer’s work for reference. Thank you Cathleen Tarawhiti for the use of this stock photo!
I always feel I’m in the process of learning, and many times there is this feeling of uncertainty—did I get this right? Am I off the track. . . again? I guess all artists go through this to some extent.
It was fun to explore the cools and warms in this subject. I purposely left parts of it unfinished—that’s the fun of it! Let a bit of the canvas texture to show through!
Now onto another recent effort, still not done as I feel I must fuss with it some more.
Many thanks to Jason Aaron Baca and Portia Shao for the stock photo I used as reference! Mr. Baca (the model) is another favorite of mine; I have quite a few of his photos on my iPad, ready to paint!
In this photo I am struggling with a few things, so it’s not quite done yet. I hope to finalize this little oil sketch in the next day or two.
The reference photo shows a fuller-length pose of Mr. Baca in some sort of Roman-style period costume, and him looking up, searchingly . . . I enhanced that expression (plus changed his features just a tiny bit—like to mix it up!) and came up with this. I want to tweak a few things a bit more and then I hope it’s done! And onto the next painting.
And both of these above paintings were painted on Sourcetek panels. I love, love, my Sourcetek! I’ve been doing some spring cleaning and have been finding hidden pockets of Sourcetek. Here, there, everywhere they are stashed! Those 5-packs of boards in various sizes and types (oil primed linen, acrylic-primed canvas, hardboard, birch, all types!). I had no idea that I’d bought so many! Well, it’s time to use them up!
And I forgot, one last painting from a few days ago:
Yep, another Sourcetek panel, I believe! This time I used a stock photo by Stockingbird on DeviantArt. The original photo was a nude (crouched pose) but I couldn’t get past the face—the sublime warms and cools, the neutrals, they cried for attention. For this painting I used a Zorn Palette (which I’ve used before) which is an excellent way to get back on track with color. You only have black, white, vermillion (orangey-red) and black to work with. You mix all your colors with that. Adding black to colors can cool them down and you can create some good subdued blue-greys and greens with the addition of black. Another interesting experiment. It won’t be the last time I use the Zorn Palette!
I finally had enough, it’s done, it’s done!
This is another painting from my “novela” series (which I explain better at the bottom of this post), where I explore emotions in more depth. I always enjoy doing these paintings—so many expressions to capture! Totally love it.
I fussed with this painting for a while (you can read more of my struggles here) and decided it’s time to let it go. Time to move on to another painting! Even with the frustrating moments, I still enjoyed painting this one very much.
This painting was also my first attempt at painting on a New Traditions Art Panel, which is a bit ooh la-la and high end (too good for me! Ha!) but I had to try them out. (I’m such an art materials junkie!) I liked the lightness and sturdiness of the Gatorboard (which is like a super stable foam board with an unbendable quality) and the linen was very smooth, but somehow it seemed to suck in the paint. A bit weird to paint with. I think there are probably other linens from New Traditions that I’ll like better. (And if I don’t, oh well, I still have RayMar and Sourcetek!)