Workshop Everything but White Snow

I ran a workshop for seven students at Artsplace in Cheshire last Saturday. The name of the workshop was Everything But White Snow. I had students of all ages and all levels attending. Some of them had never painted with oils. We copied one of my paintings, Snow Blanketed Field.

The  painting was of a farm field that I painted from my living room window one winter. It was early morning so the shadows were long and very distinctive. The colors in the snow were several shades of blue, pink, yellow, orange, and purple. 

Normally, I coat the canvas with a wash of color, in this case a yellow or orangey yellow. I found that the Turpenoid did not dry as quickly as mineral spirits. This caused the paint to bleed into the top paint and produce a greenish tint. I didn't realize this at first and it was too late to do anything about it. Mineral spirits do not do this. 

Just the same, the paintings turned out great. First, I had the class do a pencil drawing to show where the darks and lights are, and to get them used to drawing the shapes. Then, I walked the class through a dark to light process. I find when I teach that students do not want to do a drawing at all. Many have a hard time getting the drawing correct. Usually, this means that the painting result is disappointing. I try to emphasize that the drawing is the most important part of the process. Understanding how the eye flows through a picture, deciding and positioning the focal point, and figuring out the values is so important. Drawing it all out helps to get the vision in your head before you pick up the brush.

I love to watch as the students move from one area to another in the process. It's easy to tell those who are used to mixing colors. Gaining knowledge of color mixing takes time and a lot of practice. Studying the color wheel and doing color charts helps, though it's not as exciting as diving into the paint and attempting to match colors on the canvas. I have done the whole gamut of mixing colors for color charts using Richard Schmid's techniques described in his first Alla Prima book.  I confess that I don't pull out the charts as often as I should, but every now and then I do look at them. I highly recommend doing the color charts.

 

The students nearly finished their paintings, and seemed rather pleased with the results. I think some of them will continue to work with oil paint. I had fun teaching the class. They were all very excited to see what they could do. I was pleased to see how well they did.