Rusted Old Kerosene Can!

[Leopoldo1]

Items used: drop cloth, water glass, leaves, rusted kerosene can, apples and antique clorox bottle with cork.

Here is a still life I set up with only north light coming in from a very, very small opening in a very dark studio. I have always been excited looking at the painting method of chiaroscuro (lights coming out of darkness) in paintings at museums. The great italian artist Carrivaggio comes to mind. It is a rather very simple technique that always seems to enhance drama, things lite up brightly, half tones, dark shadows and reflected lights that creates mystery.

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/18-Feb-2002/kerosenecan.jpg

[arourapope]

The morning is breaking wide open and peeking into the old shed behind the house, gently kissing the items long forgotten that have made that shed their home, items that once worked in calloused hands, items that have their own wild and wonderful tales to tell.....
hehehehe. Sorry I couldn't resist. This is beautiful as usual, Leopaldo. Your work continues to fascinate and inspire. In fact, I'm running out of creative ways to say "kudos!"
How on earth could you see your painting in that light though? When I did that still life with the bones and the candle, I kept having to turn the light on and off to see the painting vs to capture the lighting. Did you have to do something like that too?
Aurora

[Rose Queen]

You say you admire chiaroscuro...well, Leopoldo, I'd say you nailed it! Bravo!

[Victor]

This is a wonderful painting and very interesting the way you produced it. I too would like to know how you managed to paint in the dark. Perhaps you used a low light source over the easel or perhaps the light shining on your subject also lit the canvas.

I must give it a try one day. :clap:

Victor...

[Leopoldo1]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by aurorapope
The morning is breaking wide open and peeking into the old shed behind the house, gently kissing the items long forgotten that have made that shed their home, items that once worked in calloused hands, items that have their own wild and wonderful tales to tell.....

Wow Aurora, I fine artist, a avid gardener and a poet as well! I knew it! God I love stuff like that, patinaed by time and the worn items by the handling of humans.

How on earth could you see your painting in that light though? When I did that still life with the bones and the candle, I kept having to turn the light on and off to see the painting vs to capture the lighting. Did you have to do something like that too?
Aurora

Very similiar. If you are carefull with your easel and palette lighting you won't have problems with the lights washing over onto the still life. What is important is to have the same concentrated lighting for both the easel and the palette, the subject isn't important. I have a easel light that attaches to a overhead support that just lights up the painting support and palette. Thanks!

PS. more poetry!

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by Rose Queen
You say you admire chiaroscuro...well, Leopoldo, I'd say you nailed it! Bravo!

Thank you Rose! Pasadena, hence your name. As a kid back in the early sixties when I lived in California, we use to take our sleeping bags and camp out along Colorado Blvd to view the parade New Years Day. Today I understand it is a circus and besides I now live in Oregon and my old bones on those street corners, well you know. The times are a changing...............:oL

Thanks Victor!

[walden]

Great painting-- VERY dramatic!

[arlene]

you nailed it! my jaw is still hanging!

[vallarta]

Very nice work....excellent detail etc...I give you my 3 clap award.
:clap: :clap: :clap:

However, call me a crumugen if you will, but I do question the lack of color in the fruit and pot. To get the blinding whiteness...that is what shows up on my screen....on the apples and can you would need a light source that would seem unrealistic to me. If the light was at a lower temperature....( cooler and more yellow) then the fruit would have either some green or red or both showing and the can would have some copper color.

Even if you used a halogen lamp as a source....(and why would you?) you would not get that blinding light. Perhaps it is my screen...or the transfer program jpg, but I think that there is a need for color. It might be slight...a tint perhaps...but color.

vallarta

[Leopoldo1]

Yes V, I do agree, the digital image washed out the color in the lights, but please V, show us some of you work, since you have been critiquing for some time on all forums, with a teachers advice, and yet we havent' seen any of your work? Even if you have to borrow or steal a image, please let us know what you are creating so it will compliment you voice! :)L

[walden]

Hear, Hear! Vallarta keeps telling beginners asking about limited palette choices that the only yellow they need is yellow ochre. That is simply bad advice-- I have NEVER seen a reputable artist recommend yellow ochre as the sole yellow on a limited palette. For some paintings, maybe, but across the board? No.

I offer my advice on things I feel I know a bit about, and anyone is free to assess the value of my advice by clicking my website url and reviewing my work. There are too many "experts" on this board who have presented no credentials whatsoever.

[arlene]

Originally posted by Leopoldo
Yes V, I do agree, the digital image washed out the color in the lights, but please V, show us some of you work, since you have been critiquing for some time on all forums, with a teachers advice, and yet we havent' seen any of your work? Even if you have to borrow or steal a image, please let us know what you are creating so it will compliment you voice! :)L

here you go:

http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=26787
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=26101
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25762
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=26078
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25760

[Phyllis Rennie]

Beautiful painting! And thanks for the definition--I've sometimes wondered EXACTLY what that ch..... word meant.

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by Phyllis Rennie
Beautiful painting! And thanks for the definition--I've sometimes wondered EXACTLY what that ch..... word meant.

Thanks Phyliss! That Italian word, chiaroscuro is so hard to pronunce properly. I am always screwing it up, trying to act like a art intellectual around my wifes artists friends. We have a close Italian friend who taught me once the correct pronunciation but my memory seems to be scooting right along with my age.:crying:L

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by walden
Hear, Hear! Vallarta keeps telling beginners asking about limited palette choices that the only yellow they need is yellow ochre. That is simply bad advice-- I have NEVER seen a reputable artist recommend yellow ochre as the sole yellow on a limited palette. For some paintings, maybe, but across the board? No.


Well Lisa, I agree! Yellow Ochre is one that I definitely have on the palette, but also I use 3 others yellows for the range that I need to explore. Those are Lemon Yellow, Cadium Yellow Pale and Cadium Yellow Deep! :)L

[arourapope]

Originally posted by Leopoldo


Thanks Phyliss! That Italian word, chiaroscuro is so hard to pronunce properly. I am always screwing it up, trying to act like a art intellectual around my wifes artists friends. We have a close Italian friend who taught me once the correct pronunciation but my memory seems to be scooting right along with my age.:crying:L

key-ah-ro-skooro
The single o's are long. The double oo's are like the oo's in "cool."
:)
Aurora

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by aurorapope


key-ah-ro-skooro
The single o's are long. The double oo's are like the oo's in "cool."
:)
Aurora

As Professor Higgins would say,"By God, I think she's got it!" Was that a quote from My Fair Lady? Thanks Aurora! I detect some Italian lineage here?:)L

[arourapope]

;)

[vallarta]

I recommended limited pallet to be black white yellow ocher, light red, and colbalt or ultramarine blue. When I recommend a limited pallet for a beginner I mean LIMITED. Not three blues, three yellows, three reds, a few greens, and a violet, an orange, etc.

I have put some of my work on here in the past. You were just not looking. Have been sick for a few months and am not painting much now. My diabetis has kicked up big time and one of the symptoms of the disease is that I lack the dedication to do much painting. Formerly did 4-8 hrs a day (sometimes more) have a hard time working more than an hour a day. Have been working on a large Grand Canyon and that painting may take a year to complete.

Also have two still life paintings in the works.

Now regarding advice and criticism. Even if I never had painted...which I have for many years....I could still give opinions based on the study of art which I have done. I have a library of over 100 hard cover books on art and several hundred magazines.

vallarta

[Wayne Gaudon]

vallarta

And after reading all your books, I can assume you think that gives you the right to Private Message members telling them they produce garbage and have no talent or insult them personally when you should be concentrating on the critique of the art and not trying your best to degrade the artist.

I can't think of anyone who wants to improve, ever minding a good constructive critism no matter how harsh, but when it goes beyond trying to help and thrives on degrading, then, you have a problem!

PS... even if I think you are out to lunch, I do hope you get your health back.. so good luck in that area of your life.

[walden]

I'm sorry for your illness, vallarta, and I'm sorry that I didn't search and see your work, so I misspoke. Nevertheless, yellow ochre is a dull, neutralized yellow. A palette limited to the three primaries should use the closest possible matches to true primaries, which means that cadmium yellow pale or light is a MUCH better choice. You can grey down a primary that is too intense by mixing in a bit of the other two primaries, but you CANNOT make more intense a neutralized pigment. The purpose of a limited palette is NOT to limit what you can paint accurately, but to get the maximum possibilities out of a minimum number of pigments.

Kevin Macpherson uses a palette of ultramarine blue, cadmium yellow pale, alizarin crimson, titanium white, and a bit of Winsor green-- his work is available here: http://data.fineartstudioonline.com/dataviewer.asp?keyvalue=125 .

Frank LaLumia uses a split primary consisting of Cadmium yellow pale, cadmium yellow light, cadmium red light, quinacridone red, ultramarine blue, cobalt blue, and titanium white-- his work is available here: http://www.lalumia.com/

Morgan Samuel Price advocates a limited palette of seven colors-- I don't have her book with me right now, but although she includes yellow ochre, she also includes cadmium yellow. Her work is available here: http://www.morgansamuelprice.com/

A palette excluding an intense, primary yellow might be ok for portraits only, or for desert scenes, or other specialized uses, but I have never read a book that recommended such a palette for all-around use. Yellow ochre is a fine pigment, and certainly has it's place on an expanded palette, but recommending it's use as the SOLE yellow on a limited palette flies in the face of the science of color, and in my opinion, telling beginners (who often don't know much about color theory) that it is the only yellow they need is flat out irresponsible.

[Linda Ciallelo]

Leopoldo, Your painting is beautiful, fantastic. You have come very far in the last year or two.
And , by the way, my name is pronounced "Chill- ello":D

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by Linda Ciallelo
Leopoldo, Your painting is beautiful, fantastic. You have come very far in the last year or two.
And , by the way, my name is pronounced "Chill- ello":D

Linda, you and Aurora you Italian maidens! Your name I would have never pronunced correctly. I can speak spanish fairly fluently. I know they are close, but the ia in spanish is ia!

Thanks...........L

PS: as always I look forward to your posts!

[vallarta]

Now I know that the problem is in the reproduction I give you my 5 clap award. :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:
vallarta

[YLCIA]

Leo, you already heard everything., but I do want to say it anyhow : how wonderful!Beautiful work.

Julia

[Leopoldo1]

Originally posted by YLCIA
Leo, you already heard everything., but I do want to say it anyhow : how wonderful!Beautiful work.

Julia

Julia, your are sweetie pie and thank you! I like hearing it again like I know we all do. Thanks.............L

[MKathleen]

Hi Leopoldo:

Just wanted to add my praise of your painting it's lovely!
Congratulations:clap:

Best,
Kathy:D

[Leopoldo1]

Thank you Kathy!.....L

[pampe]

the light which is both vertical and rounded

takes my breath away


bravissimo:clap:

[Leopoldo1]

Pam, you are too kind! Thanks for your very kind words. Wow, Montana, Glacier Park! Lucky place to live for your inspiration.....L

[Allan Jameson]

A wonderful painting....very worthy of poetry.

[Leopoldo1]

Heh, Down South Allen, Thanks! Just saw a great Australian movie last night called, "Lantana"...L

[Victor]

Yes, this is right up my street, a realy great piece of work. I must try it myself sometime. very well done.

Victor

:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

[bierstadt]

This is a nice piece Leopoldo. Well done.

[cagathoc]

stunning! :clap:

[belladonna]

Leopaldo I am sorry I didn't see this one sooner. I think I’ll be hanging around the still life forms for the next while… Lots of nice things going on in here and I would love to see a close up of that bottle. :D The reflections in it look fantastic! (I can't spell it let alone pronounce it, but I love to see this kind of lighting in a painting too.) ;)

[Leaflin]

Hi Leopoldo
I can't spell it or pronounce it either but I do know that I can enjoy looking at your wonderful piece.
Auroras poetry is the icing on the cake :)