Paul Cezanne - French artist 1839-1906
‘A Painter of Apples’
The Still Life Arrangement at right
This
painting was done on MDF board and primed with three-in-1 Primer from
Bunnings. (Taubmans 3N1). Alan used a rigger brush and some small flat
brushes for this demonstration. (Cheap Bunnings brushes)
Alan gave a
presentation before he commenced painting giving a brief background on
Cezanne and some relevant points concerning this picture.
After Alan
completed the arrangement of the still life he proceeded to block the
picture in quickly with a piece of charcoal. He drew rough shapes,
squares, ovals etc. in groups just how he wanted them arranged in the
picture then proceeded to shape each area how he wanted it to be
with more definition altering anything that needed to be fixed.
Critical guidelines were put in at this stage.
When he was satisfied
that it was done he brushed the excess marks quickly off the board with
a light cloth leaving only light outlines. Next he outlined the main
shapes with the rigger brush with grey acrylic paint because of the
paint’s quick drying characteristics.
The colours in the fruit, oranges
and mandarins were applied next in bright dobs applied with a small
flat brush from one area to another distributing each colour of
choice to various areas of the picture. Cad yellow and cad red was used
as the base bright colours for some of the fruit other colours were
introduced to give each piece a more interesting look. Purple was added
to red for some shadows. Shading went in as he went along. Alan
dipped his brush into turps every now and then to keep the paint
flowing evenly. He had a clean brush for each colour, keeping the work
quite sticky. The palette was a pad of disposable sheets. Grapes were
painted with purple leaving highlights as he went; ultramarine was
used for grape shadows. Yellow ochre was used for the basket with added
burnt sienna for basket shadows.
The general idea for this work was to
alternate warm and cool with a little space in between. Bringing
everything together with the folds in the cloth Alan used white in
blue and doing the strokes in the same direction. The kettle had been
under painted blue. Alan applied the dark shadows on the kettle and the
brown rusty look with some of the blue showing through leaving some
highlights and blending with white where needed. The black lines were
drawn in along the way. At the finish the colours were strong and warm.
The overall effect was a most appealing painting. He achieved this
in one and a half hours. Given three hours it would have looked even
better.
Once again Alan, thank you for a most interesting demonstration and entertaining afternoon.
- Report by Naine Sankey
Alan's finished "Cezanne"
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Whitehorse Art Society
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