No one expects the comfy chair. 

If all goes as planned, this painting should be finished tomorrow evening.  More then.

It’s been a busy week, but I did finally get back to the easel.  Last Wednesday I painted the remaining view, and was all set to get started on the chair.  I even had my palette mixed, when I noticed that I had somehow tracked a small amount of the white paint from the sky over a section of the already finished skirt.  It cleaned up nicely, requiring only a little re-painting, but did use up the remainder of my work day.  I never did figure out how I managed that particular paint transfer.  I didn’t have paint on my hands or maul stick.  I don’t know if I’m just an unusually clumsy painter, or if the others just have enough sense not to mention their own Chernobyl moments.  In any event, there was no permanent damage done, and I did get around to working on the chair yesterday.

The chair in my scrap photos is actually a sort of tweed fabric, but I wanted something a little softer for the painting.  I’m going for a velvety, micro-suede effect which, so far, seems to be working.  It’s been an interesting exercize in texture painting since the chair and the wall behind it share an almost identical palette, and I certainly don’t want the chair to look as though it is made of concrete.

This fan brush, a Winsor & Newton Regency Gold 570 #2 is my oldest, and one of my most trusted tools.  I used this brush in the bridal portrait I panted of Sara in 1998, and on most every painting between that one and ths current project.  It is with the upmost appreciation that I officially retire this brush today after discovering that it’s ferrule is finally losing its grip on the handle, resulting in a serious loss in pressure control.  And, as you fellow painters out there can appreciate, pressure control is everything when it comes to fan brushes. 

I can’t bring myself to throw this brush away, but it will be replaced in my quiver with a shiny new Robert Simmons Sapphire S48L #2 fan brush.  You have large shoes to fill S48L.  Large shoes. 

I’m slowly making my way through the background of this little painting.  I think I’ll tackle the left window next, and then paint the chair before finishing with the floor.

I have finished the background outside the window on the right side of the painting.  I’m trying to keep the contrast low and the value high to justify the bright lighting on the figure and to keep the view from taking over the composition.

Actually, the contrast in this image is much lower than in the original, mostly bcaust the bright white paint on the darkish canvas is freaking my camera out.  Once the other side of the view is finished, I should be able to get a better photo. 

Both the skirt and the hair are finished, which means…so is the entire figure.  The reflected light off of the underlying canvas texture and the brushstrokes in the hair is really obvious in this image.  In fact, it did a fairly good job of messing with my head while I was painting the hair as well.  Some of the colors were close enough together that the slight variations in reflectivity made it hard to accurately judge their relative values which slowed down the process significantly.  It also would have made me look quite insane to an outside obsever as I bobbed and weaved around in front of the canvas trying to get a good angle on the situation.  I’m pretty confident that I ended up with an acceptable finished head of hair, but once all the paint is dry and the bright outside background is painted, I may have to do some touch-up work.

The skirt was less evasive, mostly because it’s lighter value made the reflected light less noticeable.  I’m quite happy with the way it turned out.

And by that I mean more work done on the painting of the skirt…

I almost finished the thing today.  One more session should do the trick, and then on to the hair.

These seer-sucker skirt.  They’re maddening I tell you.  This is the third one I’ve worked on and although it is proceeding just as slowly as the ones that came before it, even though it is actually a lot smaller, I’m almost giddy about how it is turning out.

I’m giving equal blame for the slowness and credit for the giddiness to this new painting style.  The whole not blending thing and the form turning give such great results for drapery, but following all the minuscule folds and wrinkles in the texture of the fabric is pretty intense.

It occurs to me that I should really decide on a title for these things early on, so that every blog post doesn’t have the same heading.

Anyway, I have finished the shirt.  I cannot say enough about how profound and yet a simple change just thinking about turning the form has had.  It really informs most of my value choices now, regardless of what my few reference photos may have to say…and I think the results are impressive.

Here is a shot of the full canvas.  I will be working on the skirt next.

I just finished work on the foot, which completes all of the flesh tones in this painting.  I had forgotten about the knee, and painted that along with the other leg and ankle on Thursday.  The leg fought me pretty hard, and I will readily admit that I did some fairly intense blending to get it under control.  Today I painted the foot.  It is a testament to the color-matching power of this color string palette layout that I was able to so seamlessly move from yesterday’s work to today’s, and also to the color control it affords that I was able to paint the foot, which was really weirdly lit, as well as I did.  This photo isn’t the best (yeah, I always say that) but I am really excited about hoe this piece is coming along.

The drapery is next…at least the shirt.