Busy times!

Well my art classes are coming to an end for their usual summer break until September, this then gives me a little more time to work on my own projects, that's not to say that I haven't been busy painting in between classes! With that in mind I thought I would share a little of what I have been up to!

I'm still playing around with the oils to make myself comfortable with the varying ways of starting a painting but also finding a style that really suits me. Although at times I have found it frustrating, overall I am so glad I made the decision just over two years ago to switch mediums from Acrylic to oil, the way I paint now is far looser than my illustrative style and way more enjoyable!
I can safely say I have learned more in the last 2-3 years than in the previous 20 and my focus has definitely changed in what I like artistically and what I am looking to achieve in my paintings. Although my output in terms of finished paintings hasn't been great and I really have neglected things like contacting galleries I have furthered my understanding in many artistic subject areas which hopefully will reap rewards in the long run, maybe all those stacked up failed canvas boards will have been worth it!!

I'm still starting my studio pieces with an imprimatura in transparent oxide brown, some areas scumbled some as washes with a little added sansador, this lets me map out my values and concentrate on the composition of the painting such as below

Now at this stage previously I would start blocking in the large shapes in the appropriate hue, chroma, temperature etc, however I realised that would mean my edges would be all soft so I decided to add a thin block in in the large areas, let them dry and then start to work into them, hence a variety of edges and also I can then leave some of these areas showing through in the final painting, see below

I then decided to do a flat, thin block in of all the middle colour values over the entire picture and let it dry. Currently I have about 8 pictures drying at this stage such as the one below (obviously I haven't finished the wolf section yet)

I'm finding I like doing these layers very thinly with bristle brushes as scumbles and just straight oil paint at this stage no medium. They are meant to be just a block as the appropriate ground colour over which I can lay the finishing layer in one go, I will have to wait for these to dry before giving that a go!

Anyway, chattering done for the day, off to do some more painting!