Sunday 18 March 2012

How to paint nudes

Thigh View
I did quite a bit of exploring this weekend. Trying out different approaches to painting the nude. Trying to convey a different mood in the pictures. Something not so pretty and comfortable. Something that thrills the senses fires the imagination! Something direct and honest that acknowledges the animal beauty of the human body. I tried lots of paint. I tried very little paint. I tried washes and daubs and splashes and strokes. I tried clashes of colour and gentle harmonies. Somehow none of it did the trick. Eventually I came back to the approach that I've developed over the years that pleases me most. I know it's not quite there yet but once again I feel it does actually have some integrity.

2 comments:

  1. Nice, I love her expression! I would have liked to see your experiments too, to see why you thought they didn't do the trick.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'll have to show you sometime and maybe you can explain why to me! Faces dominate the picture no matter what pose the body is in. It's difficult to make the body the star unless you leave the face out.

    ReplyDelete