Hi Libby, Before making any suggestions would you mind answering a few questions? What brand of oils and medium(s) are you using? What kind of brushes do you use (including painting knives)? What support are you painting on? These answers will help me to give you better feedback.
This is very nice Libby, I like it. It gives the feeling of good atmosphere and lots of space and I think you did the folds in the clothing well. Great mood.
Anne, Thanks for the comment. My sister-in-law wanted this for her son for Christmas. The little boy in the picture is her son who is now married and the man is her father who is now deceased.
David, I am sorry that you haven't gotten a reply to your questions. I just to post them and see they disappeared into where I don't know. this painting was done with water soluble oils (WSO) using linseed oil developed tor them. As far as brushes go, I am not sure what I used because I am still experimenting with different ones to find something that I like. I bought some Beste brushes this summer that seemed to work well. I have a few pallete knives but know I need to get some others because I am limited by what they will do for me. Unfortunately, I am not near any art stores and it is difficult to determine the sizes and flexibility on line. I see from your website that you are really good at capturing and using light. Any comments you have to help me with the oils will be greatly appreciated. Libby
Hi Libby, Thank you for answering my questions and I'm sorry to have taken so long to get back to you. The reasons for the questions are to get an idea of how you approached the painting. Just using linseed oil as a medium always felt to slippery to me, I could never get the balance right. You might try another of the mediums that mimic more of a gel type if possible. They are a lot easier to control.
Overall, this is a nice painting. You conveyed the feel of the scene pretty well. To strengthen it you might consider a few things. First thing I noticed is that you have a very narrow high key value range. This makes if very hard to establish darker tones for the light to shine from. If you pulled down the range a bit your lit passages would feel more illuminated.
The composition feels too equally divided into thirds. Your negative shapes are a bit even, especially the sky and the dock. You have the brightest bright in the image as your main subject; the boy, this is good. Yet it looks like you used pure white to try and make him pop. If you drop the key down, you could use your white just in the brightest highlights. The palette is fine but I can't really see enough detail to judge really what's going on there or how you are handling your edges.
It would have been interesting to see something going on between the two subjects; perhaps just the boy looking up at the man.
Here is a new one in my quest to learn oils. What do you think?
