Oils

I’m sneaking up on how to work with oils…trying a lot of small canvases (think low fidelity prototyping), also working in series to see how oil renders the same subject differently from media I’m accustomed to and studying from the masters. (e.g. the Bay Area Figurative Artists movement and Lucien Freud) Another sneak attack approach is just cutting down the variables by working in a limited palette so I don’t have to think about color issues as well as the medium…

 

Oil on canvas | 12"x12" | 2011

I like seeing the evidence of how a painting is made. Both Lucien Freud and Diebencorn use these luscious brush strokes that define the forms they’re working with. “Masters studies” are a great way to deconstruct how they work.

Study from a Lucien Freud painting |Oil on canvas | 12"x12" |2005

Oil on canvas | 12"x12" | 2002

I love the way Richard Diebencorn chooses the simplest artifacts from our daily lives and makes them into a painting that comes across as a kind of anthropolgical moment in time.

Study of a Diebencorn still life | 12"x 12" | 2001