Portrait Painting in Oils: From Monochrome to Limited Palette

Wednesdays 6:30 - 9:30 pm

8 classes: $595 (includes model fees)

Instructor:

Jennifer Balkan

Prerequisites:

Drawing and painting experience from life required.

Class Description:

In this class, students will improve upon their overall approach to painting the portrait with an emphasis on brush control, paint mixing, and color harmony. We will approach painting by learning to see our environment as composed of simple shapes and values, lay down shadow and light masses with confident brushwork, which will lead to stronger visual statements and weightier paintings. Students will work from a model, beginning with short poses in monochrome and gradually work up to longer sessions in full color enabling them to make quicker decisions leading to a more intuitive approach when handling the paint.

Supply List:

  • Canvas boards/panels/canvas paper. If you are using inexpensive pre-primed canvas or canvas board, be sure to add a couple of coats of acrylic gesso to it and sand it lightly so that you’ll have better less absorbent surface to paint on.

    • (11) 9"x12"s

    • (6) 12"x16"s

  • Palette - please bring in a clean palette, flat, wooden or melamine (melamine is easier to clean)

  • Steel palette knife (3" trowel)

  • Odorless mineral spirits (no smelly solvents). Gamsol and Turpenoid Natural are good less toxic solvents

  • Container for your mineral spirits

  • Paper towels or rags

  • Pocket mirror

  • Value viewer of some kind: here is one example.

  • “The Masters’” Brush Cleaner & Preserver

  • Small container of linseed or walnut oil

  • Brushes – assorted. Try hog and synthetic blend

    • Filbert 2, 4, 6, 8

    • Flat 2, 4, 6, 8

  • Oil colors (please use professional grade)

    • Titanium white (large tube)

    • Winsor yellow

    • Winsor red

    • Ultramarine blue

    • Raw umber

    • Transparent oxide red (sometimes called Transparent Earth Red)