Wednesday, March 04, 2009

Firenz Afterglow

I hope that the fact that I already have a title for this piece bodes well for this work, but am wondering if it's just wishful thinking. Why? Well, today I decided to document what I had worked on last night at studio and the first thing I did was knock a glass ashtray full of sea shells off the buffet when I grabbed my little table easel which resulted in shattered glass and broken shells all over my clean floor. At least I learned that The Maids do an excellent job of cleaning under furniture.
Within 5 minutes I had another disaster on my hands when the painting I was photographing (Firenz Afterglow) was hit by a gust of wind and it and the table easel went crashing to the patio floor, putting a little dent/tear in the canvas. I understand that there are relatively easy ways to fix it, but made me sad nonetheless.
They say bad things come in threes, so you can bet that I'm watching my every move today to make sure that nothing precious gets damaged. No picking up the doggies, no handling delicate or expensive items today. In fact, I should probably get off the computer since I find it much more valuable than most things in my house!
One second more and I'm done. This painting is a lesson in low values. How to make it interesting when there's very little contrast. How to understand just how to keep the values low and still convey light in the painting. I did a lot of scraping last night, because every time I'd squint I would see that I'd gotten it too light. Should be interesting if I can get this lesson learned. And now I have to buy a new tube of paint because I don't own any Old Holland Schveningen Blue (Thalo Blue).

3 comments:

Camille LaRue Olsen said...

You've got a nice composition here. I hope the sky keeps the lines that are almost perpendicular to eachother. I know it's probably just blocked in right now but it almost feels finished to me -- really restful to look at it all blurry. For some reason it has the look of being up on a rooftop to me, looking down and out over this great view. I like the low values.

Connie said...

I feel the same way about the sky. I worked on it and then sat down across the room and was blown away. I have an issue with what I see as an eagle's head in the splotch of orange that is supposed to be more diffused, but will live with it this week.
Yes, it was taken from a hotel balcony and I eliminated the shrubbery/tree in the foreground that was illuminated by the flash. I feel like I don't need to be too detailed, but want to learn this lesson of low light, so we'll see how far I take it.

MANPOLO said...

Keep up the good work and thanks for sharing.