Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Workshop - Day 3


Workshop Day 3

What a difference a day makes! After just 2 days, it seems as is I had known the artists around me for a month!

Today we had a demonstration of knife work, again by building fairly thin layers. You tend to think of paintings done with a knife as being rather heavy handed, but Sean demonstrated that while it is a very textural method, it is possible to control it. With the use of a drying medium, he will be ready for the second layer tomorrow, which is astonishing.

I started two new paintings, so I could keep working while the others are setting up. I had a small 4 x 12 inch canvas that I brought along on impulse. The other one is 16 x 20, and it will be my knife painting.

I am getting into using India ink to sketch out my paintings. The narrow canvas is now going to be an abstract waterfall. I had put modeling past on it with a painting knife, and let that dry, then used 3 different colors of acrylic to simply take the white off. I don’t know why I used all three, except that I had done the underpainting for the other 2 I laid out yesterday, and simply had it. With the texture and colors I decided to use not the usually colors, but the basic components of the colors. So that one will be abstract, and the last, large canvas is going to be water lotus. I think that will lend itself to the texture inherent in a knife painting.

I am using galkyd lite for a drying medium and to thin the paint along with gimsol as a thinner and solvent. These are two new products for me. I really like the galkyd lite. It does thin the paint, and makes it dry quickly with little dulling. So I really like that product. I can see the advantages of the gimsol as a solvent. It also helps the painting go on smoothly and dry quickly. Both products are by Gambling. The class this week also covers water-soluble paints, so the equivalent drying medium is Max Quickdry. While I have been introduced to some fantastic paintbrushes, they are simply out of my price range. I cannot at this time pay $22.95 for a single brush. I am sure they are worth it, but not on my budget.

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