Moonlight Reflection

I've just finished painting Moonlight Reflection. Originally, it was another painting, most of which you can see in image one, but it seemed too flat, and it left me feeling uninspired; so I took it out of it's frame, and set to work thinking I would add more colour and texture, but that's not what happened...

Image 1

Image 1: The painting is oil on canvas, and as it was already browns and pale purples, I continued with those colours for a bit, then decided I hated them and spread flat newspaper all over the canvas (it stuck because of the wet paint), smoothing it with my hands and then lifting it off, taking a good bit of the paint with it.

Image 2

Image 2: I always feel I tie myself too much to an image I have in front of me whether it is a photograph or a sketch, so this time, I just went with the colours, and the types of brushes I was using (lovely big flat square ones), still using the image that had been on the canvas before.

Image3

 
Image 3:  I added more light and felt the painting would benefit from the introduction of yellows and oranges, colours I tend to shy away from when using blues and purples.

Image 4

Image 4:  I use a blending brush quite a lot (it looks like a fan), and enjoyed blending the colours on the canvas - this way, I never know what is going to happen, and end up with colours and shapes I never expected.

Image5

Image 5:  The painting still seemed a bit flat, and as it is oil, and the paint can be scraped away if I've made a mistake, I used a lime green that I had bought in Korea, and blended like daft. I used the flat of the brush, and for the first time the edge of it too, which added a wonderful texture to the thick paint. Most excitingly, though, just doing that has given me ideas for a series of paintings that I'm really looking forward to starting on.

Next week, I think.