Still Life Flower

Name: Njeri Ndungu
Date and Time:

2016.March.3, 4:00pm

Location: Chandler 260
Subject: Transfer Image to Canvas

(For some reason I never fully document the pouncing process.)


Black and white poppy^


Poppy after pricked and charcoal transferred (tape to canvas to secure)^


Image of the resulting charcoal outline (tacky lead white still)^



Materials Shot for yellow ochre outline^


Proportion Yellow Ochre to linseed oil^


Yellow ochre paint for outline^


Apply^


Final^

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Name: Njeri Ndungu
Date and Time:

2016.March.7, 12:10pm

Location: Chandler 260
Subject: Apply dead layer and day tones

Conversation while painting:

• PSmith: Oil and tempera painting helps you achieve a much more finished product
• Lila: artistry in the cartoon element – artistry – capturing an image and transforming it into a drawing
• Njeri: But the painters would also be tracing and taking from herbals
• PSmith: We now consider artistry to be the design, creativity of conception, originality – perhaps they conceived the artistry to be about skill, producing the same thing over a long period of time in a workshop - skill as the collective work of a workshop – tracing and copying not considered a bad thing
• Sophie: even in literature – Shakespeare not making original plots – same flowers in various bouquets are evident

Painting

• Dried outline (charcoal still doesn't blow off from tackiness of the white which has now dried it)
  • perhaps we should have tried using the feather again to remove charcoal like we did with the panel with distemper

• Acrylic paint used for the dead layer because it dries faster
• Quarter-sized amount is still quite large - shared between two people and still did not finish

• Paint in following the contours of the underdrawing (so much charcoal still visible even through the opaque acrylic paint)
• Can still see the under drawing
• Leave open the highlight colors?
• Everything takes such a long time – to dry, the change after it dries

• Final acrylic dead layer with charcoal showing through
• Erma says it should be as flatly applied as possible – try to hide the brushstrokes as much as possible – unfortunate because the first petal I did has already dried with the strokes set – a bit plastic-y so can’t actually erase them

• Let dry on window sill for 30 minutes

Discussion on what to do next...

• Follow the distemper layering discussion
• Trying to speed up process : do the highlights (white/ yellow stamin etc,) and the shadows (lakes etc)
• Question: do we go back in for the day color or do we just leave it as the vermillion?
• It’s the vermillion with a little bit of lake according to Beuers.
• Look at the image: in the shadows there is not highlights

• Materials shot for day tones
• Follow the distemper layering discussion
• decide to use the recipe for Red Peonies:
  • [Red Peonies] One should paint the Red Peonies with vermilion in the sunlight, and mix in a little black to make the day or middle tone, similarly add black and brown for the shadow and a little more brown red if black is used for the reflection. When dry they desire the same glazing and glossing of the highlights as the Ranunculen.
    
    

• Use far more vermillion oil paint than lamp black
• VERY small amount of lamp black used (about half of a spatula tip) but makes the vermillion (about two pea sized drops) V. dark

• First mix with palette knife

• Compare to picture to check tones (need to correct for how bright the acrylic red is)

• Add a bunch more vermillion to offset v. strong lamp black
• Add pea sized amount to try to lighten, need about 4 more for the desired color.

• Mull for about 4 minutes

• Final mid-tone color

• Scrape and transfer into small container so that others can use the equipment

• Tested the paint out on a piece of watercolor paper (doesn’t account for the very bright acrylic that we are painting on)

• Vermillion already had oil added to it but we added about 3 drops of linseed cold pressed oil in order to make it easier to manipulate

• Apply paint in areas corresponding to the example
• Much milder contrast than expected when applied to the acrylic ( closer to the color or the charcoal outline that shows through the acrylic layer
• Seems like there is a lot less area to paint than previously perceived
• Perhaps this means that you can’t just paint the areas on the painting that are obviously the mid-tone but rather a bit more since you need to account for the areas that will be partially covered with highlights – makes for a more natural gradation from dark to light
• Easy to get lost when trying to copy the color – when switching gaze from print out to the canvas become disoriented and can’t find the corresponding area to paint.
• Doesn’t appear to be much of a change in the effect

• Final with day tones applied
• 
  
• Much more dramatic change when photographed

• More dramatic at an angle as well

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Name: (Also the name of your working partner)
Date and Time:

2016.[Month].[Day], [hh]:[mm][am/pm]

Location:
Subject:

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ASPECTS TO KEEP IN MIND WHEN MAKING FIELD NOTES

• note time
• note (changing) conditions in the room
• note temperature of ingredients to be processed (e.g. cold from fridge, room temperature etc.)
• document materials, equipment, and processes in writing and with photographs
• notes on ingredients and equipment (where did you get them? issues of authenticity)
• note precisely the scales and temperatures you used (please indicate how you interpreted imprecise recipe instruction)
• see also our informal template for recipe reconstructions

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