Today I went to my first formal oil painting class. I have played around with oils before but without really appreciating what I was doing. After a few clumsy hours painting a lobster still life with some level of success the instructor asked me if I wanted to try painting a self portrait.
Always keen to try new things and push myself artistically I agreed. She offered to draw and paint half the portrait in order to demonstrate techniques and to show me how she would approach the painting.
Four hours later and the part complete painting is finished. I am really pleased with it and think the deconstructed nature of the piece really adds and abstract quality to it. However the main thing I got out of today was an appreciation of how to use oil paints better and I cant wait to try them again!
Let me know what you think, I might try and do more deconstructed images like this as I experiment with oils more.
More info: Instagram
The instructor drew a sketch on the left and I added my self portrait to the right.
She then showed me how she would approach building up the tones of the face starting with broad highlighted colours first. I then colour to my half of the face (on the right).
The hardest part was trying to keep the brush strokes bold deliberate.
The finished painting, I am really pleased with my first attempt at this and can't wait to try oil painting again.
