Unfortunately I had to take a few week’s break from painting. Life basically intervened and took away all my time, which was extremely frustrating. I was just dying to create, but couldn’t. Finally I had several days to myself. I knew what I wanted to paint – a beach scene which would allow me a ton of freedom, and I expected I might even finish it in a day. Here’s how I started out:-
Only the barest sketch of a plan, and straight into filling out areas with colour. Already though I’m making a pretty basic mistake given how I prefer to paint. I’m filling out way too much detail in that dramatic sky while other areas are still white. This is going to lead to problems.
The previously-unpainted area across the lower third is going to be a rocky breakwater, which I want to provide strong contrast to the rest of the painting both in terms of colour values and angular lines versus the flowing nature of the rest of the composition. I’ve given it a naples yellow base coat, then drawn over that with latex masking fluid which I’m here trying to dry with a hair dryer (because I’m impatient).
Why use masking fluid? Well, I want to paint most of the rocks in dark tones, and with acrylics it’s hard to go over that with lighter colours. I mean, you can, but they need to be solidly impasto otherwise they tend to simply disappear, and I didn’t want all the light surfaces of the rock to stand out that much.
So I’ve painted the dark colours then peeled off the masking fluid to reveal the orange underneath. I’m ready now to start painting those lighter surfaces which will be the key to unlocking this painting. I’ve also reworked the sky with more layers, and I feel it’s coming on well. I’m feeling pretty excited at this point.
The rocks are now painted, and I’ve been brave and added a bunch of dramatic touches to the sky which I thought was a bit bland.
Hmmm. Suddenly, I have to pause for thought. Yes, I’ve still got the foreground to paint, but this isn’t working out how I’d imagined. I expected some of the more bright and boldly coloured rocks would be a clear focal point, but that isn’t happening. The eye is confused, not knowing where to go.
Perhaps I’ve overdone the sky a bit? No worries, I’ll reduce the contrast on some of it and hope that helps, while working on the foreground.
OK, the foreground is done, or close enough bar some tweaking. I’ve worked some more on the sky too, and tried to make key rock surfaces stand out the way I wanted. I expected at this point that the painting was pretty much finished – I even signed it! But I wasn’t happy. It just wasn’t right, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it. The more I looked, the more disappointed I felt.
The easy option at this point is to put it away in the cupboard and forget about it for a while – probably forever. I’ve certainly done that before, where I felt a painting had irretrievably wandered down an erroneous path from which there was no return. Instead, I decided to ask some friends for their thoughts.
Most said it was beautiful, they loved it, and didn’t understand my doubt. They thought (and they’re probably right) that I was too tough a judge of my own work. However, if I don’t uphold my own standards on what I want to create, how can I ever improve? How could I ever paint artworks of the quality that I aspire to?
Fortunately two friends came through for me. One said that the sky was way too busy. I was appalled to hear this, though I didn’t say so – I’d worked for ages on that sky! But when I thought about it, I realised she was right. Even after I’d scaled it back, the sky was simply too much and was drawing the eye away from the rocks but not strongly enough to provide any satisfactory focal point. That was the core problem, and I needed to significantly lighten and simplify a large portion of it.
My other friend, also an artist, suggested adding people or wildlife. That’s something I usually resist unless a scene really calls for it, as whimsy is something I don’t do well, but there was so much open space here.
So, I took a broad brush and started lightening large areas of the sky. I reworked the shadows/reflections in the water too, then added some seagulls. I removed one of the lower rocks as it didn’t look right, and added a splash of white reflected light to a rock on the left. Suddenly, it all came together.
The changes were subtle, but to my eye the difference in the overall composition was night & day. There’s somehow a lot more light shining down from above onto the rocks now – the changes to the sky had far more impact than I thought. The seagulls aren’t overly whimsical nor do they dominate or detract from the scene.
Are there morals in this story? For me, yes. Avoid going too detailed and dramatic too quickly. Don’t work on some areas in depth while leaving others unpainted, unless the area you’re concentrating on is the central focus of the painting. Find friends who are discerning & willing to give honest advice. And above all, don’t be too quick to give up.
“Cloudy day at the breakwater” is available for sale, for $980, from my Bluethumb store.
