The Double Primaries Palette

 I am a plein-air (open-air) painter and usually find my "Painting Stations" while on bike. Consequently I need to travel lightly. I use a Guerrilla Painter ThumBox, a pochade box.  See the photo below:

Pochade box in action



Pochade box folded



I can carry only a minimal amount of tubes of paint. This compactness of the pochade box has led me in an ongoing search for the minimal amount of tubes of paint to take with me.

At first I tried a so-called Beginners, or Basic Palette which consisted of Thalo Green, Ultramarine Blue, Thalo Blue, Alizarin Crimson, Lemon Yellow, Cadmium Yellow Medium, Cadmium Red Light, Yellow Ochre, Burnt Sienna, Burnt Umber, and Titanium White. However that was 11 tubes of paint--too much; my little pochade box was packed!

Furthermore, I am a  fan of the Impressionists and wanted to paint in a Neo or Post-Impressionist manner.

So, I looked up Monet's palette and it is said that he used these colors: Chrome yellow (the modern equivalent is Cadmium Yellow Light) ,Cadmium Yellow ,Viridian Green, Emerald Green, French Ultramarine Blue, Cobalt Blue, Madder Red (modern equivalent is Alizarin Crimson), Vermilion (or Cadmium Red Light) and Ivory Black (Black only if you're copying a Monet from before 1886--he later banished the black).

That is 9 tubes--not bad!

The following link is to Monet's palette info and his painting techniques, etc.

http://painting.about.com/od/oldmastertechniques/a/Techs_Monet.htm 



Monet's palette



So, to sum up Monet's palette, he used a light and dark version of the primaries of red, yellow and blue as well as a light and dark green; with the addition of white.

With these colors one can make every color that is found in nature. These are the rainbow colors that are found in refracted light.

Yet, I found I could cut even more tubes of paint if I used what is called The Double Primaries Palette.

The double Primaries Palette consists of a warm and cool version of each of the primary colors: red, yellow, and blue. One can make their own greens, dark and light, as well as browns and oranges and purple.

The Double Primaries Palette

Simply click on this thumbnail to see the colors listed.



All the tubes I need for The Double Primaries Palette.



 Instead of Thalo Blue Tint I can use a Cobalt Blue and make it into a tint by adding a little white.

The Double Primaries Palette that I am now using is, RED: Cadmium Red Light, Alizarin Crimson, YELLOW: Cadmium Lemon Yellow, Cadmium Yellow Medium, BLUE: Cobalt Blue (tint), and French Ultramarine Blue. Plus Titanium white.

That is 7 tubes of paint!

As I experiment and learn more about color I will share it here. To see my paintings one can go to my Flickr photostream at http://www.flickr.com/photos/43692916@N03/

Now, let's go paint!

Guerrilla Painter ThumBox

I used to carry, out into the field, the wild open-air, a French Easel, which is as heavy as carrying a Toyota Prius on one's back.

Here is a photograph of me using the French Easel:

Since I already have a bad back this was unendurable.

Consequently, I felt empathy for Vincent van Gogh and Monet and Pissarro and the rest of the herioc Masters of En Plein-air--the painters of the open-air.

I finally broke down and bought a small, modern day version of the pochade box.The pochade box according to Wetcanvas.com, "...is a compact, portable painting studio in a small box. "Pochade" is a French word meaning "quick (color) sketch...Traditional pochade boxes were characterized by three simple elements: A hinged lid which functions as an easel and wet painting carrier, a palette which slides out to one side, and the lower portion of the box which contains paints and brushes...These ingenious, old-fashioned devices were used extensively by 18th and 19th century landscape painters...The pochade box...was originally designed to be used for performing plein air 'studies', which are smaller, and less detailed than a finished painting...."http://www.wetcanvas.com/Articles2/5946/234/

I bought a Guerilla Painter ThumBox which is a pochade box. It is an awesome implement in the plein-air painter's repertoire.

Here are some photos of my Guerilla Painter Thumbox:

And my Guerilla Painter ThumBox in action, in the open-air:

And the resulting painting from that day:

 I am grateful to have the lightweight equiptment that is available to today's plein-air painters.

If you are a plien-air painter and are interested in purchasing a Guerilla Painter Thumbox or some the larger pochade boxes and painting supplies here is a good link.

I have used them to order my stuff and have only good things to say about the products and service: http://www.cheapjoes.com/

Cezanne's Apples and the Tree-Forms of The Forest

I like painting trees because they are such strong forms. I painted these trees while visiting my parents on their woodland estate.

About.com, under the heading of art history, defines form as "Form is an element of art. At its most basic, a form is a three-dimensional geometrical figure (i.e.: sphere, cube, cylinder, cone, etc.), as opposed to a shape, which is two-dimensional, or flat." http://arthistory.about.com/cs/glossaries/g/f_form.htm

The About.com definition is a basic and well accepted one, but creating form in art has been approached from a couple of different angles.

As an example of one method, I used to create form by painting each object, in a painting, a local color ( e.g., a red apple), then I  highlighted  and shaded the object by lightening and darkening that local color: making light red for the highlight and dark red for the shadow. Often I lightened the red by adding white and darkened the red by adding black.

However, there is another way to create form; rreferring to this way, Lois Griffel, in her enlightening book, Painting The Impressionistic Landscape: Lessons In Interpreting Light And Color quotes her teacher Charles Hawthorne. He says, "Let color make form, do not make form and color it in. Work with your color as if you were creating mass--like a sculptor with his clay." ( Charles Hawthorne was the founder of the Cape Cod School of Art which taught the Impressionist methods.)

To see--perhaps the best-- examples of this technique of creating form, I suggest looking at Paul Cezanne's still lifes that contain apples. You will see how Cezanne sculpts the apple by using warm colors such as red and yellow to advance the form toward the viewer and cool colors such as violet, green, and blue to cause the form to move away from the viewer. No wonder Cezanne once declared "With an apple I will astonish Paris!" http://thinkexist.com/quotation/with_an_apple_i_will_astonish_paris/259340.html

In the trees and shadows of my tree painting above I use a cool version of  red, blue, and a muddy purple to push them back a bit and distinguish their forms from the bright yellow light. I like the painting but realize that I still have a lot to learn.

I will go now and peer at Cezanne's apples, hoping to learn from the Master.

The Willamette River Series

A Haiku Painting

I raced down to the river on my bike so that I could catch the sun before it ducked behind the trees.

As I pedalled toward the Willamette River I reminded myself not to get lost in the details as I painted.

; there are so many trees and bushes along the river that it is easy to feel overwhelmed.

How can I remember to keep the painting simple?, I wondered. The thought of Japanese Haiku came to my mind. A Haiku is a short simple poem with a limited amount of syllables.

I even took out a pen and wrote the word Haiku on my hand so that I wouldn't forget.

Once I got to the river I had to hurry to set up and mix my paint on the palette. I was just in time because the sun saw me and went fugitive: hurrying like a hermit crab to hide in the cracks of underwater rocks.

I began to paint.

Haiku, I said to myself as I painted. Don't overwork it, just put the paint down and don't move it around, just put it down and leave it!

Here are the results for Sunday, 08-08-2011:





The first painting

The second painting.

Abstract-Impressionist Tree

Today, I had fun painting this tree. I could've gotten up and danced I was enjoying myself so much, but I didn't want to just fling the paint anywhere.

I love painting and I hope it shows in this artwork of the tree.

The Summer Painting Campaign!

Here are photos of some of the paintings I have done this summer. I didn't here include works in progress or the mentor paintings (copies I made, in order to learn, from the old and modern Masters).

Please leave comments here on my blog if you can--I love to hear from others and when I find a comment on my blog I am surprised by the gift and encouraged. Thank you!

A Flower Kicked My Butt!

Monet once said that if it were not for flowers he probably wouldn't have become a painter.

I can understand that kind of love for the beauty of the flower, but what Monet didn't say--at least not as a quoteable quote--is that the flower can kick your butt.

This flower kicked mine.

I have a feeling that I will be painting many more flowers.

I painted this flower on Thursday, 08-04-2011, using a palette knife to apply oil paint to a 6" x 6" masonite panel.

Chasing The Summer Sun

I have begun doing a painting a day.

I did this painting this morning, Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011.

One reason I want to paint daily is because I know that I will not be able to paint as much as I am now when I go back to school in the fall--ironically for a degree in Fine Art!

(However, I am looking forward--after a summer break-- to going back to Lane Community College and learning more from the great painter and Instructor Adam Grosowski.)

I like painting the sunrise because no matter what happens during the rest of the day I know that I have done at least one painting.

I like the painting that I did this morning, which I call Pink Champagne Sunrise.

I don't always like what I do and occasionally scrape the paint off my painting surfaces. At times like this I wonder why I am crazy enough to try and be an artist. 

I like Pink Champagne Sunrise  because of its strong value contrasts, abstracted simplified forms, and it's impasto texture. I got the texture by applying the paint with a palette knife.

I started using the palette knife because I am trying to use bolder simplified forms and trying not to overwork my paintings. When I get down there, close to the painting surface, with a small brush, I tend to move the paint around and around and add too much detail: I get lost in the forest for the trees.

I am looking forward to doing many more paintings before school starts, but I know that I am also going to want to paint the fall with its varied colors: cadmium yellow, cadmium red medium,  alizarin crimson, moss green, ochres, and orange--as well as other colors.

Now, I need to get out there while I can and chase the summer sun!

Knife Attack!

Last night, I did two paintings: one was very small (2" x 2 3/4"), which I overworked and the other was slightly larger 4" x 4' and turned out better, being stronger and abstracted.

I painted both of the paintings with a palette knife--no brushes!

I hunched over the smaller sized painting for almost an hour and consequently put in too much detail,

then, as I was packing up, the sun dropped even lower over the hills and the sky turned a burnt orange with some reddish scatttered patches; the hills went from a greyish-orange to a blue color.

I couldn't walk away from that!

I dug through my pack and pulled out a 4" x 4" wooden art panel and began slashing at it with my palette knife.

At first I didn't even care whether or not the painting worked out, but when it did begin working my main concern was to stay out of the way and let it just develop.

Finally, I reached the point where I dare not touch it and I knew I was done.

I packed the finished paintings into a cigar box and rode away.

Behind me the hills had turned into dark sillouttes and there was only a slight pinkinsh color in the Prussian blue sky.

The air smelled of mint, lavender, and freshly cut hay and grass.

I felt happy as I rode my bike with my paintings packed safely on the back. Happy that I had decided at the last minute to ride out into the West Eugene Wetlands to paint the sunset.



The first, smaller painting.







The second painting.