Read Introduction on Landscape Oil Paintings

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Step 5

For the fifth step-finishing off the treetops – fold the paper until you can hold it firmly. Again, dip just the tips of the paper in the paint on your palette. Choose light colors. Our most important consideration is that we want to create a representation of leaves, but don’t just rely on green. Light red will accomplish the same thing. We’ll really see what light can accomplish when you let it dance to its heart’s content. Light will illuminate and exalt even a portrait. How much more will it do when your subject is an organic miracle of nature that lives and dies with the sun! So put on l a little red with your green or pale blue. By the time you’re done, the tops of your trees can be crazy quilts of color, a lovely swirling hubbub of leaf and sunshine with tiny patches of sky peeking through. The novice just paints an object, dull and alone, but a good artist paints it in the full complexity of its relationship to the forces around it. He knows that when you look at a leaf, a good percentage of what you actually see are other elements that are forever playing upon it.

There you are in front of your easel with a wad of toilet paper dipped in light, spangly colors. Now press the paper gently against the canvas so that you cover the upper limbs of each tree. For all intents and purposes, the relatively large circles of thin bright paint that you create this way will complete the essential part of your landscape painting.

Using the same sort of easy wrist movement, drag another wad of toilet paper, also dipped in light colors, against your sky. The more interesting the color scheme, the more vibrant and convincing will be your background.

Again, I would advise that you spend a few moments I looking at the sky. Study its dynamism. The clouds pour I into the blue, while streaks of color from God-knows-where stretch across the horizon. So for goodness’ sake don’t hesitate to be creative with your color scheme. You’ll surprise yourself with just how new and delightful an unexpected burst of orange or pink can be. Naturally, not all your dabs of color will be equally pleasing. Often you’ll be disappointed by a blue that’s too pasty or a yellow that’s too deep. It’s a lot like cooking. Even the best chef puts in too much paprika once in a while. Fortunately you don’t have to eat your art, so the situation is considerably less critical.

To start the lesson follow the steps below:

Read Introduction on Landscape Oil Paintings

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 1

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 2

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 3

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 4

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 5

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 6

Step 4
If you look at what we have done so far, you’ll notice that the first three that an extremely talented child of about eleven might do while waiting for recess. You have the trees, the water, the sky, the reflections, the shadows. You can see where the land ends and the water begins. But you don’t have a painting yet. It’s just a picture.

The next step-using toilet paper-will make it a real painting. It’s my piece de resistance, the real trademark of my method of Instant Art. Just as Marconi had his wireless and John Wayne had his horse, I have toilet paper dipped in paint. Here’s how it works.

In the first step, we used toilet paper to add to an abstract schemer of paint. As I have said, toilet paper is not just a joke. Among other advantages it makes it a bit easier to keep a light touch, and that is very important for composing those subtle contrasts and vibrations that make a painting seem truly alive. Even some experienced artists using brushes have a tendency to belabor their canvases with too much paint. That’s less likely with something as thin and wispy as toilet paper, even if it’s folded over a few times.

At this point when we need to make the water sparkle, we must be able to drag a wad of toilet paper dipped in paint across the water to create the illusion of sprightly dancing ripples. The light that plays on water is an exquisite convolution of colors. It is very difficult to capture it with a brush or a palette knife. The tendency is to paint too thickly.

You can coat the thin edge of a palette knife with light blue or even white and crease the surface of the water for a ripply effect. Thin lines of creamy blue will serve to represent the ripples reflecting the sun.

But the far better way is with toilet paper. It will more easily capture the buoyancy of light playing upon water. Dip the edges of your toilet paper wad lightly in white paint and, with a loose wrist movement, swish the paper across the surface of the water just once and then step back and observe what you have done. If you’ve achieved what you ant, make another swipe below the first one. That’s about all you need to give the effect. Practice the wrist movement for it’s the secret to creating a light touch.

To start the lesson follow the steps below:

Read Introduction on Landscape Oil Paintings

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 1

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 2

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 3

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 4

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 5

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 6

Step 1

The first step is background. Using your palette knife, coat the canvas with a fairly uniform layer of paint. Since this is a landscape you must apply color to this abstract layer, for it will eventually have to represent sky and water. So get in some healthy blues and greens, but also be creative and have fun. Don’t be afraid to include some brown, while lighter colors like yellow can also be used. Always remember, though, that the green and blue ought to be prominent.

An easy-flowing wrist motion accomplishes this background. Naturally, you will be using the flat side of the knife. When you start your first painting, spend some extra time applying the basic colors. While it is never a good idea to thicken a canvas with disgusting mounds of superfluous paint, for your first time, it can’t really hurt to get the feel of the knife as much as possible.

Already, in this rather uncomplicated first step, we have need of the toilet paper. As you know, no background is really flat. The sky is alive with so many shades of color that some are projecting towards us while others seem shy and hang back. Before you ever start painting you must memorize a basic principle: light creates depth and form. A sky crayoned by a child doesn’t really look like a sky. It is too uniform. Nothing is acting upon it, no sun is forcing one patch patch to appear distant and hazy, while causing other spots to look as if they’re bulging down on us.

To create depth in your background use the tips of a piece of toilet paper and gently dab the surface. Small dots create what is called a pointillist effect. Already you will note how I those dots lend dynamism to the surface, as if pieces of color I are dancing in various directions.

Though toilet paper is a very light material, it can still slop up a canvas if used carelessly. I therefore recommend that you learn how to hold a piece of toilet paper so that you can easily manipulate its tips. It is never really necessary to tear off more than two or three sheets at a time.

To further understand what we have just done, think of the foundation of a house. It is a beginning, a mass of inchoate material. You can’t really know what it will be until you happen to see it situated on a construction lot or between two other completed houses. It is an abstraction. Abstraction always precedes realism. The windows, the lintel, the chimney will later identify it. So too with skies and rivers: They proceed out of a swirl of anonymous color. The next time you see an abstract painting by a true master like Pollack or Kandinsky, don’t dismiss it out of hand. Think of it as matter in the process of becoming a recognizable something, and remember that you yourself have followed the same procedure as part of a more conventional endeavor.

Of course this variety also presents something of a problem, namely, which sort of a landscape should I choose for this instruction? I decided, first of all, that trees are indispensable, though many of my customers do enjoy seascapes as well. Yet seascapes would involve additional complications that would stretch the scope of this article. I decided that a good compromise would be to do trees along a river bank. That way we can practice all the rudiments of a good landscape: grass, trees, sky and water.

As I have said, your basic tools are a palette knife and toilet paper. Now, you’re going to be giving the knife quite a workout. Just about every color on your palette will be applied, and both the side and top of the knife are important. The toilet paper will add remarkable form and substance. . But it should also be used to clean your knife as you paint, so keep an extra roll or two available. Soon the motion by which your one hand, holding the paper, cleans the knife in four other-almost after every daub-will be automatic.

I realize how eccentric the use of toilet paper might seem. As we shall see, it is a very practical material and using it is not merely a scatological publicity stunt. In my autobiographical remarks I chose to emphasize how in my search to perfect the techniques of Instant Art, I chanced upon the palette knife. Yet anyone who has seen me work will likewise testify to what miracles I can do with a full roll of toilet paper and a good head of steam.

To start the lesson follow the steps below:

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 1

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 2

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 3

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 4

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 5

Follow Oil Painting Lesson Step 6