Edges

[Timothy C. Tyler]

As with underpainting, I think much too much is often attributed to those "small little pieces of red and green next to each other". I've heard this said of Rembrandt, Fechin, Bouguereau, Vermeer, Sargent and about anyone else written about at length by non-painters. I don't see much of it. If it's there and it's not visible (to the naked eye) does it count? Furthermore with the green underpainting (the effect so often referred to) only works if done with careful transparent glazing. Truly opaque colors put on top will be just that, opaque. The truth that few ever talk about is that underpainting was often just slow careful drawing and design put on lean (with turps and no oil-thinnly) and colorless with full expectation of being obliterated with later color.