New painting - boxes

Just completed a new oil painting of cardboard boxes. I used a seductive cerulean blue (provided by the very expensive Schmincke Mussini Manganese Cerulean Blue) as a complementary to the orange boxes. Click image for larger version.

Cardboard boxes, Oil on canvas, (c) Mike Todd 2011

Step by step oil painting : Step 4

This is the final step, which includes glazing and finishing touches. To glaze the lemons I remembered that I had some Schmincke Mussini paint tubes. These oil paints include a resin and a large proportion of the colours are transparent or semi-transparent, making them ideal for glazing. I used Lemon Yellow, Translucent Yellow, Raw Sienna, and Translucent Golden Green, as well my standard Ultramarine Blue and Burnt Umber. To make the glazing medium I used Stand Oil mixed with Liquin Light Gel and Sansador thinner. I also glazed the fabric using Violet with a little Ultramarine. After glazing, I decided to use some Titanium white 'specks' to lift the highlights on the lemons and cloth. This is contrary to what I said earlier on about not using opaque over transparent layers, but this is art so there are no rules! Because this was applied wet-into-wet and delicately placed, it turned out OK. Final stages were to finish the details on the bowl, and then I added a bit more dark to the fabric creases. These final details make the difference if you are going for a trompe-l'oeil effect.

I think the painting is finished, but I tend to leave paintings somewhere conspicuous for a few days to see if something starts to bug me enough that I have to fix it. Overall I'm quite happy with it, but I think it needs some gold in the frame just to lift the edges a bit.

I've painted another picture at the same time as this (click to enlarge). Although simpler I think this is a bit more interesting, which is partly to do with the lower angle of view, and something else that gives this a more metaphysical aspect. Or that might just be me. I didn't originally plan to leave the fabric unglazed, but I liked the grey, so I left it. Vote for your favourite!

Now the paintings have to be left to dry before varnishing. At least 6 months is recommended, but I paint very thinly, so these should be OK to varnish a lot sooner. I will probably leave for a month before varnishing. A temporary varnish (e.g. re-touching varnish) can be used if they need to be exhibited before then.