Still Life with Lace
July 10, 2009 at 7:46 am | In oil painting, still life | 8 CommentsI finally finished this painting which has been sitting on my easel for weeks. I started it to get back into oil painting after my trip to San Francisco. From the start, things didn’t go well – the canvas is too small, the setup is too fussy for my taste, the lace background way too difficult, and then we had a heat wave, which turned my studio into a furnace, and I sprained my ankle, so I was trying to paint with my foot propped up. I had a really difficult showing depth, because of the way the light reflected on the lace background. It had a sort of illuminated ‘holy card’ look for a while, which I really disliked, but I toned down the background, but couldn’t get it in balance – and so it sat and dried. Finally, yesterday, I decided to submit it to Nel, who is teaching an online oil painting class, for comments – and she nailed it right away. Add a shadow. Simple as that. It’s amazing what we don’t see in our own work sometimes.
This is the third version – the first two are on Flickr, if you want to see Nel’s comments.
Still not my favorite painting, but it was excellent practice. Now I have to go clean all of that dried paint off my palette…..
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Practice makes perfect! although I like it very much.
Comment by hfm — July 10, 2009 #
Fabulous Casey, it is watery and wistful and dreamy – I could gaze at this all day – now I will have to check out the other versions!
Comment by sandy — July 10, 2009 #
This is quiet beautiful and I love the reflected light prisms on the cloth below the bowl. Lovely colors too. Let’s hear it for our return to oils!
Comment by lindsay — July 11, 2009 #
Hi Casey, I like your division of the picture plane and I particularly like the softness of the edges. It’s luscious!
Comment by Peggy Stermer-Cox — July 12, 2009 #
Wow, that really DID work! Lots of yummy paint application here, too!
Comment by Laura — July 12, 2009 #
This is beautiful, Casey. I really think your oil work is stunning–I love it. It always fascinates me how different someone’s oil style can be from their watercolors, and I don’t always like both, but I love both of yours.
Comment by sue — July 13, 2009 #
That was exactly what it needed. You have such a special and unique style that is just your own. It carries across both your painting and sketching — clearly done by the same talented person! There’s a wonderful glow and mysteriousness about this painting. It leaves me wondering about the story, and also a sense of loneliness, the way the two items are there together with space around them. They almost seem to be expressing sadness at having been abandoned for so long. All that means the painting really works to me — when I get feelings and stories from looking. So much better and more interesting than just a pretty picture.
Comment by Jana Bouc — July 14, 2009 #
Wonderful glow about the blue bottle, Casey and I love the subtle degrees of light on the whites. Jana is right – this picture has a great deal of mood.
Comment by Robyn — July 18, 2009 #