DRAWING INTO PAINTING: 3R D OF 3
Paint a still life in oil Adele Wagstaff completes the transition from drawing into painting using information gained from her previous studies and explains how to mix colours from a limited palette to paint a still life in oil
Adele Wagstaff trained at Newcastle University and the Slade School of Fine Art. She has taught in Belgium, Germany, Italy and the UK. Adele has been shortlisted for the Jerwood Drawing Prize and the BP Portrait Award, and her work has been exhibited in the National Portrait Gallery, ING Discerning Eye, Royal West of England Academy and the Royal Society of Portrait Painters. Adele has published two books. For more details, see www.adelewagstaff.co.uk
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n this final part of the series we will look closely at colour mixing, and how we can mix a palette of subtle, warm and cool mixes suitable for our still life from the bright and saturated primary colours. In part 1 (April 2021 issue) a small still life of a shell placed on a music manuscript was the subject for a study of tone; in part 2 (May 2021 issue) tone and temperature were explored as we continued to move from drawing into painting. In this final step, the same set up, observed in natural light, is again our subject.
p Shell with Manuscript, oil on gessoed panel, 8311¾in (20330cm). Black and white tone study made in part 1 of this series
Colour mixing The colour chart (top right) shows how it’s possible to mix a palette of mixed greys from primary colours. The swatches were made by mixing cadmium yellow, alizarin crimson with white and complementary colours. It demonstrates the transition of saturated colours, mixed directly from the tube, to muted and subtle mixes. Little by little the intense yellows, oranges and reds transform to a range of mixes that appear more ‘earthy’ as we would expect to see if we added
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artist June 2021
siennas, ochres and umbers to the palette. White was then added to each of the mixes to make the colours softer. The resulting mixes are closer to the range of colours required for the stilllife painting. With careful mixing it is possible to
p Shell with Manuscript, oil on gessoed panel, 8311¾in (20330cm). Tone and temperature study made in part 2 of this series, using burnt sienna, ultramarine and white
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