Painting 117 - 8/25

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x8"

You know what? I think this painting is more a sign of a success than my final self portrait turned out to be. It's not a masterpiece or groundbreaking, true. In fact, this painting took half an hour, tops. But look: it reads, it has dimensionality, there is a sense of light. In short, it is a successful painting.

That's what this project was about. It was about learning how to use paint, how to manipulate it comfortably, how to stop struggling against the medium.

And you know what? I think I did it.

Painting 116 - 8/24

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x8"

I have nothing much to say about this apart from a general 'yay'. The shadow's not really dimensional enough, and the light isn't really light enough, but I like the yellows. Ho hum!

Painting 115 - 8/23

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x8"

This one is pretty thoroughly meh. The handling of the yellow is not much more than okay; I certainty don't have much of a value structure up. At least the cast shadow is good...?

Painting 114 - 8/22

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x8"

As per Tristan Elwell's orders, I have painted a lemon. It... wasn't as difficult as I feared! I wish I'd gotten the shadows a little more chromatic/less muddy, but I'm very, very happy with the yellows. It's something to keep working on, of course, but - yay!

Painting 113 - 8/21

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x10"

My tiger cup makes its second appearance, three months after the first.

The first one had a strong, direct light on it, which resulted in some interesting reflections; the seond was painted in natural light. Though I do miss those reflections and the quality of the light, in the three months I learned how to apply paint to a surface better. Also: yellow. Learning to work with yellow!

Painting 112 - 8/20

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x10"

Working with green is always hard, but this time it worked better than most. The angle of the razor head even worked out! Woah.

Painting 111 - 8/19

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Oil on gessoboard

8"x8"

This fragment-of-a-bowl comes from China! It is a little more chromatic than this, though not by much. I do wish I could get consistently more contrast in my values...