Thursday, January 14, 2010

Four Underpaintings


20x24 | acrylic on panel primed with GAC-100 (clear)
I felt a little bit like Jacob Lawrence when he was 23 years old in Harlem painting his Migration Series, as I painted all four of these panels at the same time!

Last year I taught 3rd graders about how Jacob Lawrence worked on about 60 panels of the Migration Series at the same time, he'd paint yellow on every panel, then move on to red on every panel, then move on to brown on every panel, and so on until he was completed.

These four underpaintings, I experimented with this very process. It all started because I mixed up too much blue, and then I realized that every panel needed blue, so I went across all four and painted the sky. Then for the heck of it, remembering Mr. Lawrence, I continued on this way until I had all four under-paintings complete.

As you can see, my under-paintings are very basic and not very detailed. I use them just as a map for lights and darks and colors for the next step, collage. These under-paintings are done on sanded 1/4 inch plywood from Home Depot that is sealed with Golden GAC-100.

14 comments:

  1. Elizabeth, I think your paintings are pretty detailed! They look so nice! I can't believe you are so prolific.

    I just finished my first collage on wood so you'll have to stop by and let me know what you think!

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  2. Weeeeeeel, not as detailed as they will eventually become with collage I guess!!

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  3. Sandy, I can't access your profile from your name, I need a link to your blog again!

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  4. Wow, I wonder what happened--I'm at http://artjourney-sandy.blogspot.com

    Came back to see if you had a date for the May workshop yet!

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  5. You are on a "barnyard" theme today!!! Must be noisy in the studio! Do you take these photo references yourself? Where do you go to photo? I took some sheep photos a few years ago and put them into a watercolor. They were so huge and fuzzy that they had a snowball shape! Now I wonder where I put that photo reference? I know you have done sheep too!

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  6. ALSO I went to "Sandy's" bog that she had listed in her comment and it's lovely. BUT I cannot find Sandy's name or a profile on the blog anywhere. What am I missing here. No contact #, and it is VERY hard to read what is under the title of the blog (it's like gray or something on a black background!). Sandy...where is your name on the blog? Email? Such pretty work and no information.

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  7. Ginny, thank you so much for your comments--I sent you an email!

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  8. Ginny, I have been on a barnyard streak for a while. My art licensing rep wants me to try dogs. DOGS that will be a switch and maybe I need it. The photos I work from are totally manipulated in photoshop. I take a rooster, and a barn and a horizon line from three different photos, duplicate and reduce the barn, put them all together, add a cornstalk, that type of thing. so I make my own composition in Photoshop and then work from that. I'll take one cow out of a group that I like, put her in a different background, really lower the horizon line (or raise) and add a barn or maybe not...

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  9. What a very interesting way to do these...I would have messed up and put the red of the rooster in the purple of the cow and so on! ha ha My fave is the cow, of course, and then that happy, spunky-looking goat.

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  10. Oh, yes, dogs!!! I vote for a perky, funny Boston Terrier first :)

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  11. It was an experiment, crossing from one to the next with the same color. I'm not sure I'd do it again, I think I do a better job doing one at a time really. So now I appreciate the work of Lawrence even more! And the goat, was a suggestion from the gallery I am in at Asheville, NC they wanted to know if I'd do a goat!

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  12. Love your animals! Have just ordered your DVD and can't wait to learn from it!

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  13. Thanks to everyone who ordered the DVD! I am actually surprised at the success I've had with it. I appreciate all my followers and fans!

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  14. From a viewer's POV it appears the above comments encompass an ongoing art class stimulated by Elizabeth's delightful work. Quite interesting is the dialog on this 2nd day of February!

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thank you for taking the time to read and comment! :)