Green Grapes: Step-by-step colored ground process
Green Grapes: Final Step (Step 5)
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I thought you might be interested in seeing the development of a painting on a colored ground. When you decide to own one of these works you will have a better feeling about the process and nature of the painting.
The purpose of a colored ground is to set the color tone for the ambient light in the work. It can go either way, with a warm toned ground requiring that you lay in cool tones coming forward. Or as in this painting beginning on a deep green ground, then building up warmer tones, which advance forward. The first panel shows the simple contour drawing in white conte pencil, which gives me a working drawing on the ground surface. Then I begin laying in background and some foreground color with a few strokes showing what will be in the middle ground.
Next, I want to get a feeling for how the surface will feel by modeling the shapes, particularly in the grapes. At this point I can begin to get excited about seeing the forms emerge and how the overall image is going to feel Also, I need to experiment with the colors to see what range of color I will need to get the overall balance of light, color and texture. That is as far as I got this evening (Friday night).
Since this weekend is a particularly busy one for me, I probably will not get to the final stage until early next week, maybe Monday or Tuesday, so keep tuned and I’ll post the rest when I get back to work then.
I made a few additions last night. You may need to look closely to see them. The two grapes on the right are sharpened up and pick up a little yellow/green. The stem and tabletop have added tone and shadow. I've tried to enhance the wet, slurpy look to make you want to pick one of these and eat them. The only thing left to finish is the front edge of the table to give a warmer contrast to the cool, wet grapes. It should be finished by tomorrow if I can get back to it then.
The last step is to finish the foreground tabletop. The grapes are resting on an old oak flower stand my grandfather made. He was a carpenter, blacksmith, and barn builder in Illinois and I still have some of his woodwork and tools. The painting is now finished and all that remains to be done is a signature, a light coat of matt varnish and framing if the collector wishes. As you can see, I usually like to work from left to right and from background to foreground, but may also work on many parts of the composition at once if I want to make sure the work is unified.
© Copyright Paul Wolber 2007
For inquiry about a commission or other paintings send email to: wolberinchina@hotmail.com
