Monday, March 11, 2013

It Was All Yellow

 "The Gifts of Spring"
8 x 8 inches, oil on canvas
Sold

As a transplanted Midwesterner, I still have trouble getting my head around the concept of Spring coming in March, but I like it nonetheless. From now until December, I'll be painting off the land - surreptitiously snipping branches, blossoms, and fruit as I go about my daily business and bringing them back to the studio. So, lock up your flowers....or send me your address!

In an effort to save $ last time I was at the art store, I bought Daniel Smith brand Lemon Yellow. I should have known, but my innate thriftiness got the better of me. It's a very weak paint - a much weaker tinter than the Cadmium lemon I ran out of. Hunting for a solution (and not really feeling able to paint daffodils without lemon yellow, maybe a personal problem, I don't know), I found tubes of Azo and Hansa yellow in my box of randoms. The question of just what exactly the deal is with these two colors has been lurking for some time, so I decided to attack it scientifically:


 It seems to me that Hansa is closer to lemon and Azo is just a starving artist's poor man's Cadmium. Sure, I could google it, but that would rob me of my mixing fun. I ended up mixing the Hansa and the wimpy lemon together, and happily proceeded to paint my daffodils.

Wanted to share another gift of Spring I saw today: it's Wild Turkey mating season in my neighborhood. Always an impressive display.


2 comments:

Karen Boe said...

Yellow woes aside, great daffodils! I applaud and appreciate your scientific approach - Michelangelo dug up bodies to learn anatomy - sometimes you just need to get hands-on, down and dirty for your art, and we all benefit. :)

Prerana Kulkarni said...

Very nice! love the yellows. The dancing turkeys are gr8!