SOLD - A Better View - Reworked

Regular followers of my work would recognise this piece from my 30 in 30 challenge in January 2014. It is one of those paintings where I knew something was not right but I could not point a finger at it. So after a good two months I picked it up again today and reworked it. I fixed quite a few things. There weren't major changes with respect to the proportions and stuff, but a lot of smaller changes here and there. I also pushed the values a bit more as it was full of mid range values the last time. 

A Better View
Oil on Board, 6 by 6 inches
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A look at both the pictures together to see the changes. Do you see all that has been fixed? :-)

SOLD - Bottoms Up! - Original Painting of Children in Oils

I had painted these little girls a long time back, and the result was abysmal. It is one of those paintings that went straight to trash without a thought, when I was doing my periodic review. So this is not a rework, but a completely new painting with the same reference. A bright sunny day and two curious little girls probably trying to spot some fish. What's not there to love.

Bottoms Up
Oil on Board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

Oh and by the way, I can't even begin to tell how difficult it is for me to open the fridge every time and ignore those lemons calling out to me ;-)

SOLD - Just lemons - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

So, this makes it a dozen lemon paintings! When I started this series of lemons, it wasn't planned to be a series at all. I wanted to experiment painting from life and just picked up the stuff I had in my fridge. Though I had a few oranges, apples and lots of vegetables, the lemons just got lucky :-) It wasn't planned. After painting them on a warm background, I wanted to paint them on a cool background and so one experiment led to another and I was hooked. 

Though the lemons are fun and all that, my most favourite part to paint every single time was the knife. I love getting it to look like metal and love capturing the combination of shadows and reflections. I have no more lemons in my pantry so I think I will leave them aside for a while. I will get back to this gorgeous fruit after some time, in combination with different props. I did some sketching yesterday and I am dying to get some figures painted. :-)

Just lemons
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

Let me leave you with a collage of all the lemon paintings so far. Do you have a favourite? Let me know in the comments :-)

A dozen lemons!
All of them sold :)

SOLD - Over the top - Original Still life painting in Oils

As much as possible, I try to set up the lemons in such a way that the shadows overlap between the green and red/blue papers. It gives a lovely mix of colors in the shadows and I enjoy playing around with them. With this setup however, there is hardly any overlap. What I loved instead was the pattern formed by the shadows. I just couldn't get enough of it! 

Over the top
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

SOLD - Fractions, Reframed - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

One thing is for sure, that I will run out of titles faster than I run out of compositions. I'd rather have it this way than the other way round ;-) Decided to change the direction of the knife as I got so used to painting it in one direction. I am really pleased with this one, it could probably be my favourite of the series so far.:-) Let me know what you think! 

Fractions, Reframed
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

SOLD - One by two - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

Last week, I spotted a shop nearby that was having a clearance sale of home decor stuff. Promptly went there the next day itself and picked up a lot of ceramic vases in different shapes and colors, and some other props. I have been dying to use these things in still life set ups, but at the same time, I relish the challenge of the lemons. It gives me a chance to push myself to see what I can do, given just two lemons, a knife and two pieces of paper. The whole series is just using these things. I will try to come up with a couple of more compositions I think, after which I have a whole bunch of other subjects to paint. 

One by two
Oil on Board, 6 by 6 inches
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SOLD - Upper Berth - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

The second composition with the same set of slices generally gets done quicker. I set up this one quite fast and did not think too much about composition rules and the likes. I liked it and had to paint it. That's all! :-) 

Upper Berth
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

SOLD - Right on top - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

I wanted to do one more set up from the old set of slices, that had a full lemon and the second lemon into 4 pieces. Somehow it was not coming together even after spending an inordinate amount of time. Every time I arranged something, it did not feel right. Then I picked up one more lemon and sliced it vertically into wedges, spending a lot of time again mixing and matching. At one point there were so many lemons on my table that I thought of picking up a larger canvas! :-D 

I sort of ditched them after a while and went away to attend to other household chores. I was on the road driving when this idea popped up, that I could simplify the composition instead of adding more and more elements to it. As soon as I got home, I rushed to my studio to set it up and could quickly come up with an arrangement that I liked. Some time away always helps me when things aren't going as expected. I hope to do one more with the wedges on the red background. Hope you like this one! 

Right on top
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
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Stepping down - Original Still Life Painting in Oils

When I make a single cut into a lemon, I try to make at least two paintings out of it :D Hence today's painting again is with exactly the same pieces made out of two lemons.

Stepping down
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
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SOLD - Citrus fractions - Original Still Life in Oils

Red and blue, red and blue, so today it is the turn of blue again ;-)

Citrus Fractions
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

SOLD - Step it up - Original Still life Painting in Oils

Yesterday I started this new figurative piece that was all summery and nice, just the way I like it. But for some reason, I was messing up the woman's proportions and had to erase and sketch a couple of times. So I decided to leave her for another day and went back to the lemons smiling at me every time I opened the fridge :-)

Step it up
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

Let me know what you think!

SOLD - Two quarters and a half - Original Still Life painting in Oils

After the lemon still life paintings last week, I was so excited and went and bought another set of lemons. The old ones had been made to lemonade for my very patient daughter :-) But, I never got to doing the new set of lemons because I was smitten by the roosters in between. That's what happens when there are too many things to paint and just so much time! 

At the beginning, I started with two halves and a full lemon and tried to arrange them. I wasn't very excited about anything and thought I will further split one half. And now, as I was cutting through it, they were still not fully separated and looked lovely! So decided to use them as is, carefully making sure that they do not tear apart. 

Two quarters and a half
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

SOLD - Rooster #3 - Original Palette Knife Bird Painting in Oils

Gosh the roosters continue to mesmerise me! What gorgeous colours and stunning eyes they have! What attracts me to painting birds, is their eyes. Which is why I do not prefer to paint the whole bird, I love to capture the eye and a close up of their faces. And I absolutely love images of birds looking directly into the cameras :-) 

This was by far the most challenging of the roosters, and one of the difficult palette knife paintings that I have done. Reading values within various shades of red was a huge challenge and at every step along the way, I took a b/w image of my work in progress to see if I am on the right track. So that means I have some WIP images to show you :-) 

Rooster #3
Oil on board, 5 by 7 inches
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Check out the progress of my painting from sketch to finish. I usually directly sketch on my gessoed panels.

Rooster #3 - Work in Progress

Of course, it goes without saying that the rooster paintings would have great presence when hung together. Check out a collage of the 3 paintings so far, though there will be more to come.

Roosters
Oil on board, 5 by 7 inches each
Painted exclusively with the palette knife.

Your feedback is welcome! :-)

Rooster #2 - Original Palette Knife Bird Painting in Oils

We had some awesome weather over the weekend, ice cream eating weather ;-) So we were out for walks on both days and I managed to get quite a few decent shots for paintings. I should be back to painting figures soon with the new references. Until then, enjoy some more roosters. :)

Rooster #2
Oil on board, 5 by 7 inches
SOLD

SOLD - Readers #1 - Original Figurative Painting in Oils

I love capturing images of people reading. I have references of readers all over the place - at coffee shops, parks, beaches and so on. It is one of my favourite references and I have painted it a couple of times already. While I trashed the earlier versions, I decided to rework this one from three years ago.  

Readers #1
Oil on Canvas, 12 by 4 inches
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Below a collage of the older painting and the reworked one, where I hope I don't need to tell you which one is what ;-) I am totally enjoying these collages, they give me a very good idea of how far I have come. Looking at the older paintings makes me cringe, but it is heartening to know that the journey is in the right direction. 

I have dug into my image library and have unearthed quite a few more references of people reading. I should hopefully get to them one by one. 

Rooster #1 - Original Palette Knife Bird Painting

I have been meaning to paint roosters for as long as I can remember, I love their personalities and colorful bodies. And what more, I know they would make perfect subjects for palette knife painting. So here it is, finally my first rooster. And let's just call him Rooster #1, as I know for a fact that there will be more to follow. Soon. :-)

Rooster #1
Oil on board, 5 by 7 inches
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SOLD - Sliced, again! - Original Still life in Oils - SOLD

I was so obsessed with the lemons that I was dreaming about them all last night. I wanted to set one up with reflections, based on Carol Marine's idea of using foil. I cut up a sheet of foil and tried to set up something, but the reflections scared the hell out of me. Soon realised that it was not really novice territory. 

Just as I was playing around with some more paper and lemon wedges, suddenly it struck me that I could change the backdrop in yesterday's painting. How about something that was predominantly cool with just the lemons popping out. With this thought, I rushed to my daughter's room to find some purple colored paper, but could find only something blue. I have been wanting to paint some blues for the longest time anyway and this was just right! 

Slightly modified the older composition and this one was put together in no time! I wanted to zoom in on the subject a bit more so that the lemons are bigger. I painted Sliced on a white gessoed panel primed with green. This one on the other hand was painted on black gesso.

Sliced, again
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
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I also managed to stop in between every now and then and take some snapshots. Here's a collage of my work in progress. The lighting in each image is a bit different though, please excuse :)

The yellows appear too bright on my monitor, in real, they aren't so bad that it hurts your eyes. They are much more toned down actually! I hope it looks better on yours. 

Here's a look at both the paintings together - Let me know which one you like better! :-)

SOLD - Sliced - Original Still life in Oils

This morning, I spent a good couple of hours trying to arrange and rearrange the lemons into a composition that I would like. If I were painting from a reference image, I could have very well completed my painting in that time. After a lot of exasperation, I finally came up with this one which I was not even sure if I liked or not. It was good fun painting though! 

Sliced
Oil on board, 6 by 6 inches
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SOLD - Lemons and Glass - Original Still life in Oils

I wanted to paint from life today. It is something that I have not pursued seriously, I usually resort to my reference images instead. Last week during my shopping though, I had picked up some fruits, peppers and the likes. I really wanted to give a serious shot at painting from life. And what a huge learning experience it was!

I really enjoyed the process of setting up different compositions, doing sketches and then finalising on the setup. It took much longer than I estimated, a couple of hours actually. The next time I will probably go with a much simpler set up with just one or two objects. 

Lemons and Glass
Oil on Board, 6 by 6 inches
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SOLD - Saffron Toucanet - Original Palette Knife Bird Painting

This little bird was yet another challenge in the group Paint Colorful Birds for Fun, on Facebook. What a lovely bird with such bright colors. I prefer to do them with the palette knife. 

This painting is also my entry to the Premix Color challenge on DPW. So I mixed all the colors beforehand and my palette was fully ready before even touching the canvas. It is completely opposite to how I normally work, I mix colors as I go. This was a great learning, different experience and saved so much time in the painting process itself!

Saffron Toucanet
Oil on Board, 6 by 6 inches
SOLD

Here's an image of my palette before starting painting. This is the neatest my palette has been, ever! 

One thing the premixing process ensures is that we think well beforehand about the values and colors, and don't discover midway that they are way off. I might give it a shot again!

SOLD - Soaking in the Sun - Original beach painting in oils

I love doing beach paintings, more so in winter. I keep dreaming about abundant sunshine and taking off to the beaches.:-) 

Soaking in the sun
Oil on Canvas, 12 by 4 inches
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