In this painting I had an opportunity to execute (!!) a move I learned last year in Joseph Todorovitch's class. I asked him about laying in a highlight and he informed me that the whole surface of the skin had to be prepared to accept it, so it had to be worked up in graded values to the pitch where it took the highlight at the top of the light scale. That entire conversation made me see the surface of skin differently, also for me it it was an opportunity to further break the brush stroke, which I prefer. T.'s work is in the category of "naturalism", where everything is smooth and perfect.
This baby is 2 minutes old and being held by the nurse, ...I would like to have seen the rest of the nurse....her hand is so long and flat. I bet all the nurse's bones are long. Anyway, newborn babies are fun to paint while they are still in the mashed form and a little swollen. Hard to get the photo though - most people are apologetic or thinking it's something not to show around.
I used more color and purposely stepped outside of my palette, ( alizarin, yellow ochre and ultramarine) adding cerulean to get a glowing blue green. I've been reading about people's palettes, most painters seem to pride themselves on a smallish one which is supposed to insure color harmony. Oy, another frontier.
Love your paintings! Love your posts!
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