"Paintings have a life of their own that derives from the painter's soul." Vincent Van Gogh

Thursday, December 15, 2011

A Vagary of Happenstance - finished

A few final tweaks and highlights and I will call this done. The color in this piece is somewhat unusual and was foremost in my mind once I captured the gesture of horse and rider in my initial oil sketch and then connected them to their spot in the landscape. I wanted the painting to be mostly high key and developed a palette of soft warm whites surrounding the cool, crisper whites of the horse. The orange and lavenders in the landscape and the lowering blue of the sky suggested themselves as I moved forward. Thank you to Susan Roux http://susanroux.blogspot.com/ for her comment in the previous post concerning color - I do love color and am constantly fascinated how color, value, form all play their role in translating the artistist vision in the mind to the final observable rendition. I think oil paint is a purely magical medium that allows me to place on canvas a glimpse into otherwise unobservable realities. Art and creativity is such a joy!

2 comments:

  1. Hi Susan. I like the ending of this dynamic piece. Very, very nice. Thanks for the link. I am so fascinated with color and how it appears to change next to various colors. I love how you can neutralize it to push it back and every other aspect I could possibly think of. We could have a long conversation about color and how it excites us, I'm sure.

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  2. Thanks for your thougful comment, Susan - I would love to have that discussion some day!

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