Howell - Painting with Oils

PAINTING WITH OILS

David Howell

THE CROWOOD PRESS

First published in 2014 by
The Crowood Press Ltd
Ramsbury, Marlborough
Wiltshire SN8 2HR

www.crowood.com

This e-book first published in 2014

David Howell 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 1 84797 716 8

Frontispiece: Newquay, Ceredigion, Wales

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Oil paints are frequently viewed as a serious medium requiring much more commitment in terms of equipment, materials and space to work, than would be associated with watercolours or pastels. For some painters, whilst they may intend to have a go at oils at some point, that moment never really arrives because oils are just too complicated. It doesnt have to be so. This book is not intended to be one of those encyclopaedic volumes detailing the history of oil painting, the scientific make up of individual paints or which end to hold the brushes. There are plenty of those out there already for the technically minded, that might explain at great length how Van Eyck is credited with first using oil paints or what ingredients are contained in a tube of Indanthrene Blue, but so often they dont tell you much about how to set about painting pictures. This book is a practical guide to working in oils by a professional painter with decades of experience about what works for him. It recognizes that whilst there is an extraordinary range of paints and equipment on the market it is possible to concentrate on colours and materials that make sense, that wont need a complete new studio to contain them and, perhaps most importantly, wont break the bank.

What this book does cover is the authors preferred way of working, with many step-by-step examples. It shows the equipment and materials that he uses on a regular basis and the relatively limited range of colours that have evolved over time and work fine in pretty well any set of circumstances whether hes working in the Arabian Desert or in the snow on the North Yorkshire Moors. It also discusses at some length the crucial question of how to put a painting together, how to ensure that the compositions are interesting, and how to produce work that people want to look at. Above all it is intended to encourage and help those either thinking about or starting out in oil painting and, for the more experienced, developing their ability with the medium and the whole fascinating process of creating paintings that people will want to look at.

Preci, Umbria.

The artists studio brushes, paints and easel.

CHAPTER 1

GETTING STARTED WITH OILS

When we were young most of us probably started on our artistic endeavours with pencils and crayons, colouring books, and bits of paper, and some of us might even have tried our hand at drawing on walls well we all had to start somewhere! As we got older we were perhaps given access to watercolour, poster paints and pastel but the one thing that parents and elders were highly unlikely to let us anywhere near was oil paint. Its legendary ability to end up on clothes, door knobs, small children, dogs and hamsters, as well as on passing adults, and the subsequent difficulty of removing it made it forbidden territory. Not that this mattered a lot in the early stages of artistic development but there would have come a time when most of us realized that the majority of really impressive works of art in galleries and museums were painted in oils.

La Fiance du Pirate, La Flotte, le de R.

Oil paint meant you could work on a large scale and with colours that were really bright and the fact that some of the paintings on display were hundreds of years old indicated that the medium could stand the test of time. Any subsequent experience of an oil painters studio or workspace would have only added to the impression that oils were special. That lingering tang of linseed oil and turpentine, along with wooden easels and polished palettes, brushes in pots, various bottles and tins about the place and fat tubes of paint, suggest this is serious territory!

Actually, that might be a somewhat romantic view, but nevertheless there is still a tendency in some galleries and auction houses to separate things like watercolours and drawings from paintings that is oils the real thing. We all know of course thats a little unfair, not least because there is a counter view that regards watercolour as the most difficult medium of all to work in and in the right hands it can be used to produce stunning work. However, oils allow texture and depth of colour and the ability to work on a much larger scale than watercolour. The reason that oils have survived for hundreds of years is their remarkable resilience. They can cope with being exposed to the atmosphere and, provided the painter has used proven methods of applying the paint, they can even outlast the support they are painted on by being removed from it and fixed on a new canvas or board. From a painting angle they have the distinct advantage of knowing that what you see is what you get. What is mixed on the palette looks the same on the canvas in terms of colour and tone and, unlike watercolour, it doesnt fade as it dries and so the painter can achieve levels of contrast, brilliance, subtlety and depth of colour that surpasses pretty well everything else. Oils can be applied in thick opaque layers or thin glaze washes and they allow paintings to be produced on the spot in one go (alla prima) or allow time for a more considered approach with a pace all of its own. Devotees of acrylics will no doubt claim that they offer similar attractions but there is an overwhelming and distracting pressure created by the fact that they dry very quickly and a few moments inattention or contemplation can result in ruined brushes and hardened paint in the wrong places.

A Rainy Day at Pin Mill, Suffolk.

Oil paint works well in pretty well any conditions. One of the major problems in trying to paint outside with watercolours is the time that it can take for a wash to dry on damp cold days and of course on hot days, the opposite applies. Oils work fine irrespective of the temperature and provided you learn to cope with them properly they are almost certainly the most flexible and practical medium to use both inside and out.