My first in many years - in progress!
 

For all of you that helped me earlier, thank you.

Here is my progress with my oil of Madeline:

The detail of the face, still in progress:

This is the detail of the hands, still in progress:

This is the reference photo. Since this "oil" seems so formal compared to the pastel, I decided to take some artistic license with the background.

Beth,

This is shaping up very nicely.

Be careful about that leg on our right. In the photo, that knee is somewhere out of the picture, whereas in the painting it appears that you might have tried to keep it in by raising that leg up, which creates a somewhat awkward appearance of extreme foreshortening, and also makes her look off balance. She needs to have that leg down on the plane of whatever she's seated on. I would actually copy the flower pattern in the photo at that point, letting the petals get lopped off by the bottom border, suggesting the continuation of the leg beyond the border. The pattern that you have in place now makes it look like we're actually looking at the knee straight on.

Wow Steven, you are right, I didn't even notice that. I will fix that or enter her into the Circus.

Do you think the background is working? Please say yes, I don

The background seems to be to be shaping up okay, too, though there is some peril if you let those flowers get too defined in detail or prominent in hue and intensity. She's of slight build and presence and could easily be overwhelmed by the colorful background. I guess now that I'm looking at them, I might also tone way down the flower pattern in her pants, maybe by painting the flowers a different shade of the pink in the rest of the fabric.

Also to the point of the visual power of those flowers, I think you're losing some of the girl's impact by bringing around her head a background color so close to the color of her hair. You might find that a contrasting color and value (such as the darker violets elsewhere in the background) will push that background back and bring the girl more prominently to the fore, thereby keeping her "more important" than the flowers.

No "rules" in play here, I'm just giving impressions out loud.

That too makes sense! I was thinking in my value sketch that I could lose the edges of her hair the way I have done it. That seemed to be an issue with the pastel I did of her with a different pose. I did try to keep in mind the "rule" warmer/closer, cooler/further away. But I liked how the colors were working together with this. I

As someone who has always had trouble with color temperature theory and the qualities it supposedly imparts (I'm a "blue" guy and somewhat resent its consignment to the cold, distant job assignment), I was amazed to discover in Daniel Greene's color video that he also disagrees with the "accepted rule" of cool colors receding and warms advancing. His feeling is that value contrast and edges have much more to do with the effect. That was my own experience when doing charcoals of antique plaster masks and busts. I could create substantial depth without any color at all, so to insist to me that the aerial perspective effects of hue were the determining factor in depth never made any sense to me.

Anyway, to sign off in the fashion of artists dwarfing me, "Watch your edges."

Back and forth
 

Rather than repeat myself here is a link to a recent post from yours truly:

http://forum.portraitartist.com/show...0&pagenumber=1

I hope it helps.

Marvin, as always thank you! I have printed out that whole thread and it will be placed in my lap as I work today. ;)

Color harmony
 

Beth,

You

Hello Beth: A wonderful start you have here.

I think that Steven is spot on with his comments. You have an excellent start, which has defined your form and gotten everything on the canvas. I believe that what you need to do now is mostly refining.

I am assuming that you want to keep it somewhat loose and impressionistic, so you choose how detailed and tight you want to go. The thing is, every time you go back into it and repaint a passage, the "saturation" and "finish" of that passage gets better because you are building layers of paint and refining what you already have established. I have attached a picture of a passage from one of my paintings - first coat of paint, and last coat of paint. There were probably 3 or 4 coats inbetween - each bringing the level of finish and saturation up.

The main thing I see is, keep refining your form through successive layers of paint. Watch the intensity of the colors of your background. I am with Steven that graying/value transitioning and softening makes things recede better than just cooling or warming them. As the flowers are quite close, you won't need much, but just knock the intensity of the colors on the flowers down a bit and make sure the edges are soft and they will settle into the background better.

Pay some attention to your skin tones and remember that you are basically painting cylinders, and globes, so you should pay attention to how the arms turn and the cheeks look rounded with proper value transitions.

I hope that helps! :)

Beth
 

I see some experience coming out in this work. The roll into oils will take some canvas - miles of canvas - is the old term to get a feel for the brush and knife. Thumbs you have used in pastels!

I sound like a broken record I know, but I think painting a couple of red/ green apples from life is a great warm-up. I believe working from life will show you how the colors unify (swap about) as Mark Twain used to say. The edge on the lighted shoulder is one of the best I've seen!

Concept
 

I looked again and have another thought. As you are becoming comfortable with your new tools and medium, think and read about the use of neutrals. Less intensity overall allows you to make one or two bold statements. I'd suggest you do a Leffel copy just for the learning that will come from it. I think that's his book right over to the left! Or here at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...909528-3475017

Lastly
 

Beth, lastly, you will get better advice on this site than most. The reason these oil painters can offer you valid and helpful replies is simply due to the years of using the medium. It was JSS who said,"... you will learn far more by doing than you ever would from taking a class. PAINT!"

But he didn't conduct workshops.

Never mind.

Thank you so much for all of your incredibly valuable input! I wanted to post my progress thus far this evening.

Please notice I have not done the detail on the hands, hair or shirt. And have not finished reworking the pants.

Here is the full canvas:

I wanted to add how much I am enjoying working in oils. I can

Beth:

WOW, look at the progress! It is looking great! Keep refining, it is working wonderfully.

Some additional suggestions if you are amenable:

It is somewhat hard to tell from an online photo, but look at the highlights on her arms. Highlights rarely go all the way to the edge of the form - even though cameras sometimes represent them as such, so consider moving your highest highlight in from the edge and have a one or two value darkening as the arm turns away - it will be subtle, but it will make it look rounder.

Also, look at her far shoulder. See how the super bright highlight makes the shoulder appear to come forward? I know that your pic shows light coming in from the window which is why you have that effect. It works for the picture, but not as well for the painting as you are representing her outdoors. I might suggest that you tone down the highlights on the far shoulder and punch up the highlights on the closer shoulder. Don't change the form of the shirt, just punch the highlights as they are shown on the closer shoulder, and slightly gray the highlights on the far shoulder.

Dark objects in recession appear lighter and grayer. Light objects in recession appear darker and grayer. So the colors will be more intense as the form comes closer to the viewer plane and will become less intense as we recede from the viewer plane. This will apply to everything from her shirt to her knees.

Let me qualify that I am not trying to get you to paint tighter - unless that is your goal. It is my opinion, that the best paintings whether they are realistic or impressionistic, convey reality or an impression of reality by the proper placement of values regardless of brush strokes or level of detail or finish. There is a reason why Monet's purely impressionistic water lilies appear to stand out from the canvas (they are almost 3D!) - proper placement of values as the plane recedes from the viewer. He really understood color, value, and atmospheric perspective.

I hope that helps. :)

Mud
 

Mud is not always bad. A little here and there blended into your colors will knock down that intensity. You have pure color figured out and that's a good thing.

Beth,

I'm not good at giving advice on how to correct art, therefore I don't critique much. I will, however, offer some conceptual advice.

I'm a fan of Will Shakespeare. In the play Romeo and Juliet, Friar Lawrence picks a small flower from his garden and remarks: "Within the infant rind of this small flower Poison hath residence, and medicine power: For this, being smelt, with that part cheers each part, Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart." I guess this is my normal obtuse way of saying that a mere suggestion (smell) can be better than a full taste.

It

Mike,

That was the most apt and lovely reply I've yet read. Lovely.

Respectfully yours,

Tim

Thanks guys!

Tim,

Do you mean I should "gray" down the background with some brown? Sorry if that is a real blonde statement.

Mike,

You should critique more often. Not only are you poetic, you sized me up just right. I do work too close; in fact I have not found the right eyes to use. Distance, computer or reading strength. This is especially hard when there is a model in the room too.

I understand your "less is more" analogy with Will Shakespeare. Yet I felt if I was going to do my first oil in ages, I didn

Great job! I like it.

I do think you need to work on the leg on the right. It appears to be too short and undefined. Perhaps if you were to paint the whole knee, it would actually extend beyond the canvas border.

Also, consider lighter colors on the hand on our right, which is in the shadow. Since you have decreased the darker values in the rest of the image, this hand, too, might want to be a tiny bit lighter.

The face is great. I would not do anything more if I were you. You were able to work out the ochre out of the middle of the face, which probably showed up more on the computer than in life. It is a help to see your work on the computer, as the digital reproduction is very telling. It helps you to see errant color values that otherwise might go unnoticed.

I hope you are encouraged to paint more. I greatly respect all the people who have critiqued here. You cannot go wrong by heeding their advice.

Very nice Beth!

Mai :)

Color harmony
 

Your revisions already make the piece more powerful! Now I see a clear purple/yellow complementary scheme, which is visually calming, and echoes the sitter's quiet pose.

This is something I'm also addressing in my own work: everything you put on the canvas is to support the portrait. Your passion is contagious, by the way, I'm off to paint!

Hey Tim,

While doing a little research, I was amazed to see how much "mud" Mary Cassatt uses in her backgrounds:)

I did have an art teacher that told me that no matter what road I travel, to never give up my boldness with color. I have always been very loud. Some people would say in more ways than just one!

Hello,

I would like to make a few comments. I think it has been said before in this thread but her left arm (for us left) is painted too much to the left, I placed green dots to show where the edge of the arm should be.

The form of the eye on the left (for us left) needs some attention, especially the area closest to the nose. I'm not saying she looks cross-eyed, but in her eyes is not the rest that I see in the photograph.

The left eye is placed a little too high also, this way her face loses something of the monumental quality the pose has in the source photograph.

Her left eyebrow differs a little from how it is placed in the source photograph. On the painting her expression looks a little annoyed because of that, while she has a friendlier expression in the source photograph.

You placed the hairs which fall in her face too much to the left, and the little piece of skin which we see left of that hair in the source photograph is painted too much to the left also, which gives the cheeck a strange form.

Making the shadow on the right side of her face (where her ear is) sharper and a little darker will improve the likeness, I think.

You placed the hairline a little too high, therefore her forehead is a little too high and too dominant.

The hair on the left is painted as a little too broad in volume, but this could work.

Special attention needs to be given to the way the light falls on the nose. In the painting the nose appears broken to me, sorry. The lighted area is in the source photograph more to the left.

Her left cheek is painted a little too large.

I hope these comments will help you improve the painting. It's a lovely piece, and I'm looking forward to see the end result.

Greetings,

Peter

Thanks Peter,

Unfortunately I did not see your critique earlier today, since I was a busy bee painting. As for the arm, I appreciate your pointing that out, I did not notice it. I still need to compare, but I am afraid I am too far along to fix that. Maybe this is not true in oils.

I had not done any detail in her hair at your last viewing, so hopefully I have corrected that and some of your other concerns.

Here is the progress as of this evening:

This is the detail of her face and hair. I did work on the eyes, so hopefully she is better.

Here is the detail of those @#%#% pants and her hands.

Lon,

In trying to lighten up her right hand, I am really struggling with the right colors. It keeps looking "dirty" to me in the shadow, especially trying to watch my edges with the pants.

Ah, the pants! I have not detailed any of the flower pattern on the pants, as I wanted to hear some opinions regarding them. I did add, sorry Mike, yet another flower to pull the eye back near her hip, hopefully taking some of the leg emphasis away.

I hate to be the carny who puts the brakes on a thrilling roller coaster ride, but -- Whoa! Slow down! We're barreling along so quickly toward completion here, with so many advices from so many viewpoints, that everything's becoming a blur.

Beth, you've just said two things that impel me to buy another ticket to ride. You said that the arm may be wrong, but it's too late now to change it. NO, NO, NO! (And especially in oils.) If something's not right, STOP. Look again, critically and analytically, and figure out what you're going to do (not what you COULD do, what you're GOING to do) to get it right. You can spend two days (or two weeks, if necessary) getting something worked out now, or spend twenty years looking at the painting with regrets. Now -- when you describe this as your "first in many years" -- is NOT the time to race to a finish.

You also said that you'd put in an extra flower or two to draw the viewers' eyes away from the legs. I advise rethinking that strategy. If there's a problem with the legs, fix it. Don't employ visual tricks to distract the viewers' attention away from the problem. In the first place, it won't work -- indeed, it will likely actually highlight the "problem" area. And consider what's happening in that scenario anyway -- you're deliberately working to get the viewer to look at a background area. You should be deliberately working to get the viewer to look at the portrait subject, the focus of the picture, the girl.

With apologies for any dampening of spirit, I think nonetheless that you'll be much happier with the result, and learn more from this project, if you work out very deliberate choices and strategy in your own mind as you work, rather than seeking cues at every stage. There's nearly a surfeit of advices in this thread to consider, and yet paradoxically a number of issues haven't even been touched upon.

Slow down. Give yourself time to absorb and incubate the ideas and suggestions, and then employ them with method and considered deliberation.

Beth: We are all here, cheering you on.

I have to agree with Steven. One thing Bill Whitaker did while I was with him was to spend 6 hours painting a headscarf and hair on his subject. He then spent about 6 hours another day repainting the whole thing because he felt he could improve it!

Everyone has their own take on things like this, and eventually you have to say "It's Done and that is good", but don't sell yourself short if you still can take time to improve it. My opinion only. I think you are doing a wonderful job. :)

One more bit of advice: I see long strokes down the length of the arms. Lay your paint down with the length of the form (arm, cheek, forehead, finger, etc.), but then stroke across the form as it will make it look rounder and blend your strokes better.

Thank you guys again! Believe it or not Steven, I am taking my time on this. Maybe for others it might not seem that way, but this is the only piece I am working on during the day. For economic reasons I am pretty quick with pastels, but have impressed myself with the time I am spending here, plus I am so excited by the medium that I am anxious to work excessively. I was really blown away to read that Karin spends 6 months on an oil, I am assuming that the glazing technique takes much time. Michael, I'll have to bring a gag with me to Scottsdale if Bill spends 12 hours on hair with a scarf! I will be sent to the corner.:sunnysmil

That was my question, on if I had gone too far to correct the arm in oil? In pastel, it would have to be redone from the start, but here I can fix it? I see the problem is really with the shoulder, then I beefed up the arm, mainly trying to handle the edge at first.

When I receive critiques, I like to print out the responses and look at my canvas with all the various input. Some things I may not use, because it is my work style, others have been a major learning, so I don

I was hoping someone would be able to give me some input regarding the hands. I have lightened them as compared to the reference photo, but am not sure if I have the color correct. If anyone could, please let me know if you think I am off or in the right direction, I would really appreciate it. Thanks!