Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Still Life with Pitcher and Pomegranates

Still Life with Pitcher and Pomegranates 
Still Life with Pitcher and Pomegranates
11" x 14" (27.9 x 35.6 cm) - Oil on Linen
In a Private Collection

Hello,

This is a painting I finished in January, it falls into a category of painting I call "studio painting" which means the painting technique employed involves more than just direct painting, completed all in one go.

Typically for me, a studio painting will be completed over a series of sessions, sometimes days, other times weeks, and a few paintings have been known to take months {here is one example}. I utilize all sorts of painting methods during these sessions, wet-into-wet, glazing, and scumbling. Varying the paint handling throughout the canvas to provide interest and movement. However what makes this type of painting so wonderful is the result of having layers of paint applied to the canvas.  Each new layer building and complementing the previous layers.

With this painting I worked on it over a series of weeks {luckily pomegranates keep for a LONG time} scraping edges down at the end of each painting session initially and slowly building layers of paint to present the effect I was striving for. In some places the pitcher has over eight layers of oil paint, and this is where the true beauty of oil paint is actualized. By varying the opacities of each layer, a visual depth can be acheived in a manner that is only possible with oil paint.

The reason why I love this medium so much!

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This painting and other still-life paintings were discussed in a recent article on the Empty Easel website.  I feel so honored by how my work is described, and the amazing thing is that after reading the article, I realized that the author was able to articulate aspects that motivate me to paint in ways I have never been able to express verbally. 

If you have a moment today, please take a moment to read this article.

Thanks for visiting,

Liz

1 comment:

Mary Sheehan Winn said...

Wow-such stamina. I have to say that I love it. Understated color and the depth of the pitcher are rich and dramatic.