Monochromatic Painting Practice

Three hours. 11" x 14". Photo reference used. Monochromatic painting is a terrific bridge between charcoal drawing and oil painting. I've never painted in this fashion before, but I very much like the look of it, so I gave it a shot this afternoon. Only used one color, Winsor Newton Light Red, and used rags and paper towels to rub out the whites. I'll give this technique more attempts at future workshops.

Karole

Three hours. This was done at The Drawing Club with the film Stormy Weather playing in the background for added inspiration.

Heather

Two-and-a-half hours.

Marisa

Five hours. 11" x 14".

Daniella

Two-and-a-half hours. I had to really bust my balls to bring this one to a decent finish with the time that I had.

Jee

Twos, fives, and tens. God, I felt so rusty today!

Matthew

Three hours. 11" x 14" on canvas board. When I was still taking Sean Cheetham's painting class last quarter, one of my classmates, Uyen Truong, invited me to join him sometime at the workshops held at the Courbet Art Circle studio in Santa Ana. I finally found a block of free time to do so and braved two hours of horrendous L.A. rush hour traffic to get there. I'm glad I made the trek - it's a comfortable and hospitable place to paint and draw. Browsing their schedule for the rest of the month, it occured to me that the Orange County art scene has a pool of models that is different from both Los Angeles' and San Diego's, so I'm really excited about having the opportunity to draw and paint new faces.

They have an open gallery show every first Saturday of the month, and they invited me to put up any work I'd like up on the walls for sale. I'm flattered, no doubt about that, but I've always been somewhat wary about putting price tags on my work. The extra money would definitely help me save up to go to art school somewhere full-time, but I just feel kinda hesitant about selling something I consider merely practice and that I did to have some fun after a grueling day at work. Maybe I shouldn't be so modest.

Anyway, this is my 200th post! Yeah! I'd like to think I've grown a lot since my initial batch of entries. For those of you who have been following along, thank you so much for putting up with so many bad drawings and paintings as I struggle to learn how to see again.

Here's to 200 more!

Lynda

Four hours. After playing around with a dozen or so colors in my last painting class, I felt I needed to get back to the basics, so I've returned to a limited four-color palette of alizarin crimson, yellow ochre, titanium white, and ivory black. It's slightly different from what I was using before (alizarin crimson was substituted for cadmium red). I got the idea to swap reds from Vadim Zanginian, who teaches at the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art. I'm a fan of his impressionistic brushwork; him and Aaron Coberly (who also has been painting recently with a similar limited palette) are my two big inspirations right now as far as painting is concerned. Their works brilliantly show just how much you can do with so few color choices.

Sara

Five, fifteen, and twenty-five minutes. I seem to draw better when I'm not listening to fast-tempo dance music. I surmise that it's probably because I slow down and actually think about my mark making.

Sara

Five hours. I was playing around with lost-and-found edges and going for the simple statement with this one.