MATERIALS
• Matisse Derivan Structure acrylic paints.
• Various brushes; fingers (my own); well used daggy brushes; plastic palette knifes.
• Various pastel pencils.
• Various soft pastels.
• Dulux acrylic sample pots – various colours.
• Standard large canvas, about 120 x 120 cm.
• Black gloss acrylic paint.
• Matisse Polymer Gloss Varnish Medium 7.
STEP ONE
What came first: The title or the painting? For me, it can be either. There is nothing worse than staring at a blank canvas. Normally I will rough out a couple of layouts (on A4 or A3 layout paper) of the subject I am going to paint.
I’d visualised my subject characters and what they might look like.
I sketched the characters roughly … this is where things end up in the file (bin). I like my paintings to be moving and not standing still. This was the first time I had painted a boat in one of my paintings, so I was hoping it was going to work.
STEP TWO
Painting the background – this was where I placed the canvas on the easel and looked at it for a moment, deciding on the colours that I was going to use. Being a fishing painting, I dominated the canvas with blues and whites. This was the fun part of the painting. I used a palette knife, applying four or five colours straight from tubes and tubs, covering and spreading over the canvas. I started from the middle and worked up and down, creating a background and foreground. The first colour I laid down was Yellow Oxide. I then used a four inch thick brush and gave my arm a workout, very quickly brushing and blending the colours using criss-cross strokes. Blue at the top for the sky and stronger blue at the bottom for water – showing depth – with the Yellow Oxide giving the impression of land.
Then it was time for a cup of tea while I let it dry.
STEP THREE
Using greys and white pastel pencils, I sketched the picture onto the canvas from the rough design I had worked on in Step One.
Things can change from the original concept, or get added, at this point; but in saying that, I don’t like making too many pencil marks (which could confuse me). Whatever wildlife or characters I paint will normally dominate the scene.
Grabbing my plastic plate to use as my paint palette, I got straight into painting the boat. It was appropriate I was painting a fishing painting because I felt a little like ‘a fish out of water’ painting a boat. In most of my fishing paintings, I have the characters standing in the water or on the edge of a bank.
I painted the hats of both characters – one a greyish colour and the other a khaki – then decided to concentrate on the character sitting in the boat. With the clothes that my characters were wearing, I think picking colours was actually much tougher than picking colours for me to wear.
STEP FOUR
I could see the painting starting to come together … painting the second guy and putting more detail into the faces of both; and adding more shadow effects as I went. I like to work a lot of colour into the faces.
I test the waters, adding colours … I can always paint over it if it goes wrong … but sometimes it can be just what the painting (or the character in the painting) needs. I go through stages of jumping from one thing to another as I see things, thinking ‘I wonder what this would look like if I added this stroke’, or ‘I will attack it now before I forget’. I am forever working on beards when I paint them. I am like a barber styling his image.
STEP FIVE
I finished off painting the fishing men. It was amazing how much Titanium White I used, mixing it into my colours.
Mixing Yellow Oxide or a little Raw Umber and some black diluted with water, I brushed in the shadows and details. At this stage I was starting to introduce the black gloss acrylic to give a stronger depth and contrast in the detail.
I have only recently started using the black gloss acrylic in my paintings.
FINAL STEP
I got a new plastic plate, and the colours I was going to use to paint the fish. I spent a few hours with the pastels, adding detail. I took the painting and laid it flat, and flicked and drizzled the white from the sample pot all over the bottom to resemble the motion and splashing of the water. Once the painting was completely dry, I sprayed it with diluted Matisse Polymer Gloss Varnish Medium 7.
I added the hanging cord, and the job was done.
MASTER HINTS AND TIPS
• The initial rough is made up of the most basic lines. I get a pretty good idea from the rough if it is going to work, and it gives me a good idea of the shape (landscape or portrait) and size of canvas I am going to use.
• I work as fast as I can in some areas, as I need certain colours to mix together.
• Experiment: Your excuse is, it’s being creative.
• Experimenting can lead to you accidentally creating your own individual techniques.
• Don’t try and get every detail with a brush. Instead, use different colours and grades of pastel pencils.
• When drizzling and flicking paint, do it in an open area – so you don’t become restricted with your arm movements.
• Change out of clothes that you don’t want to get paint on.