How to Paint Like the Masters: Part 7, Window Shading and Glazing

07 Tuesday Feb 2012

Posted by Jessica Libor in How To, Inspiration, Journeys, Uncategorized

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advice for artists, art expert, Caravaggio, classical realism, drawing, education in new york, emerging artist, emerging artists, french academic painting, glazing and scumbling methods, glazing for artists, grand central academy of art, how to be a skilled artist, how to be an artist, how to draw from the live model, how to draw like a pro, how to draw people, how to draw realistically, how to paint like an artist, how to paint like the masters, how to paint realistic people, how to paint well, jessica libor, Joshua LaRock, new york art education, technical advice for artists, the best places to learn, window shading for artists

Maria (unfinished) by Joshua LaRock, during the window shading stage over top of ebauche

This is the stage in the painting where it all starts to come together. In part six of this series of posts on how to paint like the masters, we left off when finishing the ebauche, a thin layer of paint and turpinoid with a few drops of oil mixed in, to set the tone of the painting.

Today, we will address layer two, using a thicker coat of paint, mixed with retouch varnish and oil (either poppy, walnut of linseed). Later, we’ll discuss the glazing.

Start out by scumbling retouch varnish or oil over the ebauche. The brings the full color to life again. When choosing how to mix your lights, keep in mind that titanium white is stronger and colder, while flake white is more transparent and warmer.

Window shading is step two of painting in the classical 19th century French academic method. They call it that because it is like pulling a shade down on a window, working in full detail from the top to the bottom of the canvas. Finishing the painting is the goal for this stage. Watch your model carefully for subsurface scattering–when light passes through and reflects inside the skin, like your hand in front of a flashlight. Places common to seeing subsurface scattering are under the eyelids, the ears, the nose and hands. Anywhere where your skin is thinner and more blood comes to the surface, you will see this subtle glowing effect.

After the window shading layer dries, you should have a completed painting. If you would like to deepen the shadows more or add more transparency to the painting, consider a third layer, by glazing and scumbling. Check out the detail from John Waterhouse’s Flora and the Zephyrs, where he used many layers of glaze to achieve a glowing look to her skin, fabric and roses.

Detail from Flora and the Zephyrs by John Waterhouse

Glazing: dark, thinned paint over lighter paint

Scumbling: Light paint, thicker and more opaque, over dark paint

In order to glaze and scumble, the painting must be completely dry, otherwise you risk rubbing out all your hard work.

To make something look glowing like oranges in a still life, glazing is the way to go. If something looks transparent, paint it with transparent layers. For the glazing layer, use GamVar, made by Gamblin, with a sponge brush.

Minneolas, by Joshua LaRock, oil on linen, 2009

That’s the final layer. Congratulations on learning how to paint like the masters!

How to Paint Like the Masters, Part 5: Advice on Rendering Details in Drawing

23 Monday Jan 2012

Posted by Jessica Libor in How To, Inspiration, Journeys

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"Antique" by Megan Byrne, Angel Academy of Art

While I was taking this workshop at GCA, I was ready to be done with drawing at this point. I wanted to get to the fun part…painting! There’s something so freeing and satisfying about the brush tip making marks on your canvas, and the ability to manipulate it. However, I disciplined myself to stay on task one more day, and was surprised at how much my drawing developed in just one day of adding details.

As you work on rendering the correct values for the shadow shapes, remember that there should never be a harsh line.

At this point, you’re allowed to think about reflected light, like the kind you may see underneath the chin, or on the side of the nose, or above the eyes right below the eyebrows. Reflected light helps support the volume you already created with your lights and darks. Once you pass the terminator (the point where the form turns away completely from the light), all light in the shadow comes from reflected light. This is particularly helpful to know if painting, when the reflected light may be a different color tint than the direct form light (for instance, the form light may be coming from a lamp, and the reflected light is a natural light from a window. In that case the reflected light would be blueish, and the form light more yellow. But I’m getting ahead of myself 🙂 ) Back to drawing!

"Maria" Final stage drawing, graphite on paper, by Jessica Libor 2011

You shouldn’t have as much information such as details and variation in value in the shadows as you do in the light. Put in LESS reflected light than you want to. You have to make sacrifices as an artist. Model twenty percent of what you want to in the shadows! It’s all about self control. Resist the urge to exaggerate favorite details such as eyelashes.

Layer from softer pencils to harder. The harder the pencil, the more light and precise you will be. Compare every value. Ask yourself, should this plane be lighter than this plane?

When rendering hair, think of it as a shining object, a single thing, not the millions of hair strands that it is. When seen in light, it functions like a satin ribbon. The hightlight actually runs in perpendicular to the way hair grows. Notice the hair in the piece below.

Study of a New York Woman, by Graydon Parrish

How to Paint Like the Masters, Part 2: Drawing

20 Friday Jan 2012

Posted by Jessica Libor in How To, Inspiration, Journeys

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On the way to Grand Central Academy in NY, NY

Hello fellow artists! I’m back on my second post on how to paint like the masters, sharing with you all the notes that took from a particularly helpful workshop at Grand Central Academy of Art that I took this past summer. Let’s pick up where we left off, at the drawing stage.

In the previous post, we had all the major shapes blocked in and were starting to work from the inside out.

Continue to check your drawing against the model in front of you. Make sure all the shapes are correct. Continue in cycles from the inside out. Give youself a rule–no rendering (shading with your pencil) yet! Rendering will only look good and correct as long as you are drawing the shapes correctly.

As you are drawing, keep in mind that there are four basic lines:

1. Contour lines: the outside edge, sillouhette of an object.

2. Form shadow: the shadow cast by the form as it turns away from the light.

3. Cast shadow: the shadow cast by the form (like your shadow on the wall). A cast shadow will be crisper and more definite than the form shadow.

4. Plane change: the subtle shifts in the topography of a form, such as in the cheekbones. Plane changes are best suggested with a lighter line.

My first stage of sketching "Maria", by Jessica Libor 2011

In this stage, begin to work towards an organic quality rather than geometric. Adjust your harsher lines with a new sensibility. Every organic form is a bunch of fulnesses rather than concavities. Again, thinking of form this way, particularly the figure, will give you that lovely sculptural feel that Michelangelo achieved in his drawings. He naturally thought of figures as full and solid because he worked primarily as a sculptor. Your job, as a painter, is to think more three dimensionally. This will bring your work to life!