Day Seventy Two: Lake George by Homer Dodge Martin
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| Painted after - Lake George by Homer Dodge Martin, Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x7, Oil on wood panel |
Homer was actually considered to be primarily a Luminist painter. However much of his work paves the way for the Tonalist movement that was to become popular in America after 1880. Today's video features a track from my last album The Lost Horizon.
Continuing on with our current assay regarding my Tonalist painting process; today we are getting into my second color pass. This is the stage of the painting where I accentuate certain areas or diminish others and, generally try to enhance what I've done in my first color pass. I can spend as much time on this stage of the painting as I did in the initial first color pass or even more sometimes.
Many of the studies in this series 100 days of Tonalism went through a second color pass, but not all of them. Actually, since having done this series, I determined that I would do a second color pass on my own 5x7 studies. In the past I have done only one color pass for my small studies. I can't resist polishing them up a little now, this is something that came out of me doing this project.
After adhering the painting to my easel with bluetac, I will start to think about what colors I might want to use to do some glazing. There are times in the past I've done no glazing at all but these days I like to do it to pretty much every painting.
The thing with glazing that you need to watch out for, is overdoing it and ruining something that you did in the first color pass that was actually just fine the way it was. This is one of the reasons why I tend to work in a series type of workflow. It gives me time to plan and think and appreciate what is good about my first color pass before going in and modifying it.
I've written about glazing on this blog in the past. My favorite colors to glaze with are ivory black and transparent earth yellow. I will also occasionally glaze with sienna. I like to modify my transparent earth yellow with the touch of alizarin crimson, the yellow has a tendency towards a bit of green quality and the crimson neutralizes that nicely.
Of these colors, my favorite to glaze with is ivory black. I don't usually paint much with ivory black on it's own. I tend to use it mostly to modify other colors and subdue their chroma.
It is a very good color for glazing because you can lay it on thinly and it has a pleasing darkening effect, especially after it is wiped off and just a bit of it has settled into the areas between brushstrokes. This is an effect that I adore and for that reason I use it quite a lot in certain areas of the painting. I don't use it everywhere on my painting though. That would be a huge mistake.
Another thing I like to do with my black glaze mixture is to tamp it on areas of the foliage with a crumpled paper towel. This can give odd bits of organic variety in the foliage areas that is very effective.
My second favorite color to glaze with is transparent earth yellow. I like to apply it to very light areas thinly. This gives those areas a wonderful warm quality. When this thinned down mixture is wiped over very light colors you can get luminous tones that are almost impossible to paint in an opaque manner.
Tomorrow we will continue on with our discussion regarding my second color pass so stay tuned for that.
Cheers,
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about 'Lake George' by Homer Dodge Martin. I was attracted to the overall sepia quality of this painting. You might notice that my study is a bit less yellow than Homers. This seems to be a trend in the entire series. One of the main reasons for this is that many of the original paintings have yellowed over time. I painted my studies to reflect what I think the fresh painting would have looked like. BTW it would be a piece of cake to tint them by doing a bit of glazing with yellow.
I enjoyed painting this in the same loose, fractured manner that Homer assumed for his painting. I feel I got a good result with my study.
To see more of my work, visit my site here
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| Original painting, Lake George by Homer Dodge Martin |
Day Three: Trees in a Field by Homer Dodge Martin
Welcome to day three of 100 days of tonalism.
Painted after - Trees in a Field by Homer Dodge Martin , Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x7, Oil on wood panel
Today's study is 'Trees in a Field' by Homer Dodge Martin.
This one went quickly as you'll see from the shorter video. It's a very simple subject as I talked about in the video. Homer Dodge Martin was a first generation tonalist. I've see some of his actual paintings at the De Young Museum in San Francisco and his work is awesome. There is one other painting by Martin in the 100 day series that I painted, though we won't be seeing that for awhile.
Video setup ig going pretty sweet now. I spent a part of today setting up Twitter and Tumblr accounts although I'm not sure if I'm going to link this blog up with Pinterest. Still thinking about Instagram too. Keeping up with all these social networks is a job in itself but it's worth it to spread the word about tonalism. Impressionism had it's resurgence, now it's time for magic and mystery to make a comeback in the painting world.
I was torn about releasing my videos free of charge but if they help spread awareness of tonalism I reckon it's worth it to share my years of hard won knowledge with all of you. I'm not saying mine is the only way to make a tonalist painting. In fact
has a lot of videos on Youtube that are fantastic. I got a lot from watching many of them.
Cheers
M Francis McCarthy
A bit about 'Trees in a Field' by Homer Dodge Martin.
Initially I wasn't going to do this one. I'm adverse to silhouetted trees against skys in general. I boosted the local contrast of my reference prior to doing my study. As it turns out the original painting is not as silhouetted.I mentioned in the video thats theres a reproduction of the painting in my copy of '
A History of American Tonalism' by David Cleveland
. Looks like that book is out of print but there are copies around. I highly recommend it.
This painting went quickly and overall I'm really happy with it. I feel I captured the essence of Mr. Martins painting. One thing that he's done here that I usually do not do is portrayed a cloudless sky. Now that I am posting the original reference, I can see that I removed a bit of yellow tint.
To see more of my work visit my site
Original painting - Trees in a Field by Homer Dodge Martin