Painting White Hydrangeas in Oil Without Solvents - See all the Stages!

A few weeks ago, I taught a workshop on painting hydrangeas. I could not have chosen a more difficult image to demonstrate!

The reference I used was a stock photo. I try to use these in my workshops, so that students can show or sell their work if they wish. On sites like http://www.pexels.com and http://www.pixabay.com the photographer has given permission for their images to be used either free or at low cost. When doing my own non-class work, I always use my own photos.

I recommend starting out by putting a VERY thin layer of walnut oil on your support. I neglected to do this step during this demo, which made my life a lot harder when it came to getting paint spread out evenly on the canvas in the underpainting stage.

I used a 16" x 16" gallery wrap stretched canvas as my support. To apply the thin film of oil, I sprinkled a few drops with my palette knife onto the surface and then spread with the palette knife and followed by rubbing with a small cloth rag. After that, I used a palette knife to apply dabs of paint, which I then also spread around with a cloth, sometimes one colour, sometimes several as in this case. Paper towels are not a good choice as they leave bits of lint in your paint film.

Why do I do this method? Well, I do not wish to use toxic solvents such as odourless mineral spirits for health reasons. Just because it is odourless does not mean it is benign. Mineral spirits is an easy way to start a painting, but so is this, it is just a new way of doing things, but well worth it in my opinion.

After I massed in part of the painting with transparent colours, then adding the thicker, opaque paint at the end. I did not have time to do the entire painting as it is rather large for a demo, being 16 x 16 inches square.

See the initial steps of the process below. 

If you have any questions, please let me know and I will try and help!

First lay-in of transparent colours, starting with Indian Yellow spread thinly with a cotton rag

I put in the thick, creamy white paint of the flower in light to gauge my values, but scraped it out afterward to continue

Starting to put in background and two more flower heads plus leaves in shadow and light and another flower head sketched in upper right

Starting to put back the thick, light paint and some detail in the shadows

Done!

Vibrant, Colourful Oil Paintings of Flowers and France with Dreama Tolle Perry

Scene from France - 9" x 12" Oil on Canvas Panel

I live in Canada, where it is cold in the winter - really cold! Like many of my fellow Canadians, if I can possibly manage it, I try to get away from the ice and snow for at least a week or so. This year I was very blessed to arrange for a double treat - not only did I get to escape to Florida in January, I also attended a workshop in Marco Island led by a lovely artist, Dreama Tolle Perry. She loves to paint flowers, cats and scenes from France. She jokes that she lives in Paris .... Kentucky.

Dreama has a colourful, joyous style of painting that is very appealing. I was interested to see what her process was for creating her whimsical works. Dreama initially began her painting career with watercolour as her medium, as did I, so I was particularly interested to see how that has influenced her work. Her process does show that influence, as she begins her paintings by completely covering the entire surface of the gessoboard that she prefers with transparent oil colours. She generally uses a colour that relates to the local colour of what she is depicting and does this even in areas that will end up light, despite the fact that the transparent oils are all dark.

Dreama, who has the best name ever, teaches a class unlike any I have previously experienced. I think her method and accessible way of teaching is particularly good for novice painters, since the whole class paints the same subject (for the first two days) in 3 stages. First, there is a lecture and then a demo of the first steps, after which everybody goes back to their easel and does their version. Dreama provides a gridded photograph upon which the finished product is loosely based. It was interesting to see how everyone had their own style and interpretation of the same exact subject, painted in a similar manner, with the the same colours.

Flowers in Mason Jar - 12" x 12" Oil on Gessoboard

Letting some of the transparent oil peek through the opaque layers that follow creates a glow that is impossible to achieve with later paint layers.

Dreama's palette consists of:

* Titanium White
* Cad Yellow Lemon
* Cad Yellow Med
   Cad Orange
* Winsor Violet (Dioxazine)
* French Ultramarine Blue
   Cobalt Blue
* Sap Green
* Richeson Shiva Ice Blue
* Permanent Rose
* Transparent Red Medium (Rembrandt)
* Transparent Oxide Orange (Rembrandt)
* Transparent Oxide Brown (Rembrandt)
* Indian Yellow (Winsor and Newton Brand Only!) 
   Caribbean Blue (by Old Holland Oils)
   Magenta 
(The * indicates required colours, although I would say get them all!)

I can't say that getting away from winter in Canada for a big didn't play a role in my decision to take a class in Florida in January, but I always go away from any workshop with something new to apply to my own work. In this case, although I am still more interested in light and shadow plus form for my paintings, I really resonated with Dreama's method of using transparent colours before touching the opaque colours and white.