Visual Art Gifts

Due to problems with my Internet provider I have several paintings to add to the blog. Enjoy!

Winter Tree Branches Painting by Christopher Johnson

As part of the Learn and Master Painting course, I had to learn how to make different brush strokes. I couldn’t practice the strokes exactly as instructed since I don’t have an easel I can stand in front of while painting, but I tried.  I later made a more free flowing winter tree branch artwork for fun with a smaller wood panel.

Winter Tree Branch Study by Christopher Johnson

The study uses oil paint while the winter tree branches artwork is in acrylic.  The colors are different in the works because even though the tubes show the same color, they are not the same. The burnt umber oil paint has a strong red tone while the burnt umber acrylic was more neutral. There is also some more variation in color because I added more white to the lighter trees in the acrylic version. I didn’t feel I had enough contrast in the winter tree branches study.  I am sure I will try some more of these in the future!

I was watching some of the videos in the Learn and Master painting course where Gayle was showing how to make different brush strokes and I was trying them and then I felt inspired to improvise and I wanted to paint a cone and well a cone by its self is a little too abstract so I turned it into an ice-cream cone.

I used a pale yellow,  brown, white, and blue. I mixed all of the non-white colors with white to get light shades. The ice-cream part of the painting is white with a touch of yellow. It is a little too creamy because I forgot that some of the top of the cone would get blended up.  It takes almost no color paint with white to make a light color. I’d say a “drop”, but oil paint is very thick.

The cone and the background were painted with the paint thinned with solvent since I don’t have medium.  I have a list of things I need to buy, but I have already gone past my original budget for the year so I hope I’ll get some art sales soon!

I kept the paint on the ice-cream thicker. Not out-of-the-tube thick, but more like mayonnaise thick and I just kept adding it until it looked rich and delicious. The surface there is about 1mm higher than the rest of the painting.   I wonder if that would qualify as impasto?

Ice Cream Cone – Second Oil Painting by Christopher Johnson