Tuesday, July 31, 2007

"Back Door, Bellevue House" 11"x 14" O/P

Bellevue House is the former home of Canada's first Prime Minster, Sir John A. MacDonald and has been restored to the 1840's period. It is a National Historic Site and is open to the general public.

The painting was created on a gesso prepared panel and covered with a reddish coat of acrylic paint. Some of this ground coat may be seen through the initial covering of oil paint in certain areas of the panel..

As it was a bright sunny day, my thought was to exaggerate the light and darken the shadow areas that I saw in the subject. I may have pushed the envelope a little far in both the light and shadow areas. After living with the paintings for a few days, I now feel that the shadows could have been a few values lighter. Just a little less contrast.
The palette for this painting was my usual limited palette. In addition to it, I also added Veridian and Raw Sienna as the painting progressed.

In spite of the heavy shadows, at the time I felt that the painting had more"umph" or "life" if you will. I was happy with it even knowing that some values had to be altered later, in the studio.

Hope that you like it !

'til next..


4 comments:

Dorothy said...

I check your site every day and enjoy your paintings. I grew up in a village in Ontario, lived in Kingston for 4 years and am now living on the west coast and finally have more time to paint. You provide excellent information about your technique and motivation and your work is terrific.

Jo Castillo said...

Frank, this is perfect. Of course I love light, contrast and color.

Thanks for the info, too.

Jo

Frank A. said...

dorothy..My apologizes for not getting back to you sooner. Glad to hear from a former Kingstonian.
Thankyou for your comments, glad that I could help. Also,Thank you for the compliments..appreciate them.
Happy to hear that you are back painting. Keep smearing paint ! :-)

Take care.

Frank A. said...

Hi Jo..Thanks a million !
For the info, my pleasure.
Sorry for taking so long to get back to you. :-)

Take care..