Building Layers

Some details as I am working on the second layer of color and glazes on this painting of Thomas touching the side of the resurrected Jesus.













After years of working on the underpainting, this autumn has seen the first color appear on my painting of Christ and Thomas with all of the disciples gathered in a room together. I am taking a lot of cues for the colors in this painting from Rogier Van Der Weyden’s famous Descent from the Cross in Madrid’s Prado museum.
It is a clunky and halting phase of the process, trying to use the appropriate colors, and the right medium, and the right balance of medium to paint ratio. I’ve had to rub out hours of work at a time, when I’ve come back the next morning to realize the color isn’t working.
It is tempting to render the layer to a finished state, even though I know there will be subsequent layers. It is foolish to carry detail too far just yet, and it is difficult to leave certain problems alone until a more appropriate time. I caught myself over-rendering the blue of Nicodemus’ robe and had to stop myself midway through.
Glazing takes advantage of the semi-transparent nature of many pigments when mixed with linseed oil as a binder. By building up multiple thin layers of paint, it is possible to achieve unique and special color and luminosity in a picture, especially in the correct light.
This painting is a huge learning experience. They didn’t teach this sort of thing in art school while I was there, so I am having to work through a lot of discovery and failure, even while taking advantage of the many written treatises on painting throughout the centuries.
This grisaille (grayscale underpainting) of the interaction of Thomas and Jesus and the gathered disciples and their community, has been slowly developing over the past three years, the drawing took about two years before that. I feel like the end of this particular phase is finally in sight on the distant horizon. I look forward to seeing the structure fully unfold and ultimately to the beginning the glazing of colors.
Grisaille underpainting of the remaining disciples of Jesus gathered together in a locked room as Thomas touches the wound in Jesus’ side.
Progress on the underpainting in grisaille for the Thomas panel since abandoning egg tempera.
I have been working with Tad Spurgeon’s text lately. It is chalk-full of information on the craft of painting, from technique to philosophy, historical research and criticism to in depth analysis of oils and their endless permutations, pigments, resins, additives, and etc, with many useful formulas and recipes. I have not explored enough to venture a review, but I am enjoying it.
I have been honored by another post by Robbie Pruitt about one of my paintings, Go On, Saint Thomas.