Pitcher with Grapes - Still Life

I thought I'd share a WIP here rather than Facebook. I'll probably only post completed images to Facebook from now on and share works in progress here. Some of you may notice that my technique, subject, style, or all of the above may change from one piece to the next. The source for behavior is not undiagnosed bi-polar but rather my utter lack of professional training. There about as many varied techniques for producing a peice of art as there are artists doing the painting and I'm trying to explore the vast range of options to find what works best for my temperment and hand. I have an appreciation for multiple styles from painterly alla prima, to classical realism, and even photorealism. And within those styles, I'm attracted to many subjects, from wildlife, to portraiture, and my newfound appreciation for still life. It may all seem vastly schizophrenic for me to be rendering each hair on a tiger one moment and then producing a painterly still life the next, but I assure you there is a method to this madness. Eventually I hope to settle upon a technique which works best for me and begin focusing on that.

For this piece I am loosely following what is known as the Flemish Technique, an Old Master style that employed multiple layers which helped those artists achieve such masterful control of light and color. This is the first time I'm actually painting from life and I've already grown to appreciate why so many "purists" advocate working only from life. Modeling form and value is so much easier when I'm viewing the subject through my own eyes rather than the mechanical lens of a camera. What you see here encompasses three steps. The first step was a fairly detailed pencil drawing of my composition on the canvas which has now been fully covered. Second was the imprematura which is the brown tone that you see. The canvas is covered with thinned paint and the lights are wiped out with a rag and the darks are accentuated with more paint. Once the imprematura is dry the third step is the grisaille and is basically a value study of the completed piece. In this step form is modeled and is most important for creating the illusion of three dimensions on a flat surface. Some artists will complete a grisaille in multiple layers; here I will use only one. Once completed it will resemble a completed painting in monochrome. After I am finished with the grisaille, I'll start layering on thin glazes of color to start giving life to the piece. The technique also traditionally includes a "dead layer" which I still have not yet managed to fully understand, and depending upon who you talk to, rubbing a dried onion accross the surface between each stage, but for the sake of retaining my sanity, I will not be completing those steps.

It's fairly small, only 9X12 so the tiny grapes were giving me a headache by the time I set down my brushes. This represents probably about three hours of work not including the thumbnail sketches I did before working on the canvas. That is far more time than an experienced artist would have invested in this already. I'm still not very efficient so the actual process takes painfully long for me.