Illustrated Life: Prismatic realism

Saturday, October 05, 2013

Prismatic realism

Prism

8" x 16" oil on panel

Doing demonstrations in art workshops is an opportunity to visually show what I talk about. And as I'm working with artists at all levels, seeing is much more important than hearing about how something is done. Theory, like any topic, is more easily absorbed using the see one, do one, teach one model.

Stage 1

Prism came from a demo of a water state in my Painting Realistic Water workshop. Wait a second I hear you say, realism with those colour in there? Of course! Realism comes from values, not colour. If values indicate the changes in a surface effectively, you can use any colour you want and the piece will still "read" as what you intended to a viewer.

Stage 2

So I'm asked how do I see these colours at the edge of the wave and on the beach? Of course I don't have weird vision where I see brilliant colours appear. I do see colours by close observation, but these colours do not have the saturation of what is in the painting. My artistic license allows me to push the saturation of the muted colours I do see. By not overloading the painting with colours that aren't in the same overall family of the water, the effect can work. All the colours used here are found in the water and shoreline makeup in varying forms. The saturation and single hue application is what pulls in the viewer and directs them around the painting.