Phew, I have finally finished my version of a Jean-Baptiste Greuze painting, “The White Hat”. I started this way back in June of 2009, and finished it in late February 2010. This is oil on canvas.

The White Hat - after Greuze, by Airn LeBus. Oil on canvas, 16 x 20 inches, 2010.

The White Hat - after Greuze (detail)

I’m not sure if there was an issue with my original drawing or if something happened whilst painting, but I started to realize the facial features were really out of place and spent the last several sessions altering and moving things around, even completely painting over an eye that had been nearly finished. It was difficult but I’m glad I changed it because it looks much better now.

I used a direct technique, no underpainting…the paint is pretty thin, and very matte/non-glossy at this point (I might oil it out and/or varnish it later). If I were to do another painting in this vein, I might try painting more thickly, and with more contrast between the darks and lights. I do like the soft feel this has though, I think it works with the subject matter and color scheme.

I had some difficulties with the source photo I used, it seemed inaccurate contrast-wise and was missing a lot of detail that I had to try and “make up” or guess. The hat and clothing and stuff was also kind of difficult to figure out from the photo, and I tried to do my own version of some of it but really at my skill level should have probably just stuck to what Greuze had done. In any case I am happy with the overall results and definitely learned a lot and have a nice painting to hang on my wall.

The total time I spent on painting only was about 24 hours, usually in 1.5-hour sessions. In addition to that there was the drawing, preparing the canvas, transferring the drawing, and stuff like trying to figure out how to fix the features when they were awry (which took a pretty good chunk of time).

Categories: completed, master study, oil painting, portrait by Airn
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I think this is almost done, but I’m not sure. I might decide to make some fairly major changes, I am still debating.

Greuze White Hat study work in progress

*Update 02-14-10: I did decide to make some big changes, and altered the nose, mouth, and other stuff. Here’s the current stage of the painting, maybe it’s really almost done this time:

White Hat study - work in progress 02-13-10

Categories: master study, oil painting, portrait, work-in-progress by Airn
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Still working on my Greuze study, The White Hat. Here’s where I am after tonight’s session:

White Hat WIP 12-29-09

This is the biggest painting I have done so far, but it’s still only 16×20 inches. Maybe I am fairly close to wrapping this one up? This has progressed pretty speedily…I think I have spent about 12 hours on this, not counting the drawing part.

Categories: master study, oil painting, portrait, work-in-progress by Airn
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The White Hat, after Jean-Baptiste Greuze - work in progress

This is 16×20 inches and is oil on canvas. It’s based on a painting usually referred to as The White Hat by Jean-Baptiste Greuze, originally painted in 1780.

Categories: master study, oil painting, portrait, work-in-progress by Airn
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I finished my Petrus Christus master study. This painting is usually referred to as “Portrait of a Young Lady” or “Portrait of a Girl”, etc. His version was painted c. 1470.

Here’s my version, completed and in a nice frame. Portrait of a Young Lady, Airn LeBus after Petrus Christus, 11×14 inches, oil on panel, 2009:

Portrait of a Young Lady, Airn LeBus after Petrus Christus, 11x14 inches, oil on panel, 2009.

My version differs from the original in many ways, mostly on purpose with a couple things unintentional

Here’s the original: Petrus painting at wikimedia

I wasn’t looking to copy the original painting exactly and did my own thing on stuff like the background, eyes, highlights, and overall tone. Also, because the original is very cracked and small I had difficulty seeing how some parts looked. The necklace and decorative metalwork of the hennin hat look a lot different than his.

Petrus Christus study - detail

I painted this with oil on panel, and used a “dead layer” underpainting in raw umber first for the face and body. After I was satisfied with the way it looked, I started glazing flesh tones over the dead layer, very thin, with bleached linseed oil and just a small amount of paint.

The main colors I used in this painting were mars black, raw umber, burnt sienna and burnt umber, vermilion (hue), yellow ochre, and titanium white.

I wanted to do the text inscription after looking at some paintings by Albrecht Dürer and Hans Holbein the Younger. That part on my painting was pretty painstaking to execute and plan; it was the most complicated text I have painted so far. I did it over 4 or 5 sessions, getting the overall lettering correct first and letting it dry before embellishing it, and putting the raw umber drop shadows last when the rest was dry to avoid smearing what I had already done. I lightly oiled out the area each time before starting a new session.

Here’s a photo without the frame, you can see the detail of the inscription and stuff better:

Petrus Christus study without the frame

One of my favorite things about this painting is that her gaze really follows you around the room. Anywhere you are, if you glance towards the painting she is looking right at you. It’s a little creepy

I spent about 45 hours painting this. The drawing took an additional 6 hours or so. A lot of the painting time was spent painting and repainting the metalwork and trying to figure out how to do that and the necklace. I spent at least 3 times longer on the necklace and maybe 6 times longer on the hat metalwork than I would have if I had known exactly how to proceed. So as always, this was a learning process…that was one of the primary reasons I did this painting in the first place, so I guess it worked out

I have two other posts about this painting, to see them look at the master study category.

Categories: completed, master study, oil painting, portrait by Airn
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My framed Petrus Christus study next to my Cleopatra drawing (after Michelangelo). The cool Medusa statue was purchased at Michael’s craft store last Halloween

Petrus Christus study, Cleopatra, and Medusa

Categories: completed, drawings, master study, oil painting, portrait by Airn
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Many of my current interests are strewn around my computer so I took a snapshot to show wot I am working on besides my 2 Alice paintings and a Falero study which are not pictured. I have been drawing every day from this Andrew Loomis book “Figure Drawing For All It’s Worth” which is really awesome. I have also started a study of Jean-Baptiste Greuze’s “The White Hat”. Anyway see the picture, I even labeled the sections…you can tell I have too much time on my hands

wot i am workin on

Oh, FYI those paintings are all on wood panel and are drying face-down leaning on this plastic thing, I guess I should have turned them around for this picture…anyway you can see them in previous and upcoming posts. I am going to post the finished Petrus Christus study and Graveyard Girl painting in a few days.

Categories: drawings, master study, work-in-progress by Airn
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Although this is only my second blog post on this painting, I have been working on it for months and spending a good deal of time on it. I’m almost done…I hope to finish in a couple more sessions. Here’s my version of this Petrus Christus painting, generally referred to as “Portrait of a Young Lady” or similar:

Portrait of a Young Lady study - work in progress

The accursed decorative silver metalwork around the hat is the main thing I need to finish…it’s really caused me a lot of bother. I would have been done with this painting weeks ago but I keep “fixing” that part, I have painted over it several times now. I’ll write about it more when I post the final version, hopefully sooner rather than later!

*Update: For the completed painting see: http://www.chromaticblack.com/completed/petrus-christus-study-completed-portrait-of-a-young-lady

Categories: master study, oil painting, portrait, work-in-progress by Airn
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'A Calling', Airn LeBus (after Bouguereau), 11x14 inches, oil on canvas, 2009

Here’s a link to the original painting on artrenewal.org.

I started this in early February 2009 and completed it in early April.

I spent about 4 hours drawing it with pencil on paper in the same size I would paint, 11×14 inches. The hands were the toughest part and took several sessions to get correct.

I transferred the drawing to the canvas with graphite paper. I then went over it in sepia ink with a Sharpie and put a thin imprimatura olive-greenish wash over everything (turpentine, bleached linseed oil, ivory black+yellow ochre).

Once that was dry I started the painting, using a direct technique (no monochromatic underpainting with subsequent color glazing). I mostly used bristle brushes and oil straight out of the tube with no medium.

My palette was the following (with some exceptions like the blue pencil):

• burnt and raw umber
• mars black
• titanium white
• yellow ochre
• burnt sienna
• vermillion (hue)

I saw early on that the painting was turning out a lot different from the original tone-wise…the contrast was much less dramatic. I still liked the way my painting was looking though so I decided to keep my version as it was turning out and didn’t try to alter my version to look more like Bouguereau’s.

The original is about 22×18 inches according to artrenewal.org, and mine is 11×14 inches. Overall my version is less detailed than his, which was due to the smaller nature of my painting, my current skill level, and the amount of time I was willing to spend on this. Overall I am happy with it, especially the hands, since this is the first time I have painted hands

The painting work on this took me about 19 hours. I spent the most time painting the eye area of the face, the hands, and the clothing.

Now I need to finish my Petrus Christus study

Categories: completed, master study, oil painting, portrait by Airn
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A couple months ago decided I should take a bit of a break from my own original paintings and study some more old-master type paintings and drawings in order to learn.

Here’s one of the paintings I am working on, I started this in mid-February 2009. The original is by Petrus Christus and is referred to as Portrait of a Young Girl or Portrait of a Young Lady, etc. I’m painting it with oil on panel in an 11×14 inch size, although I think the original is closer to 8×10 inches:

Petrus Christus study work in progress

I found two fairly hi-res photos of this work, one is very cracked and the other seemed to have less cracks in it. After comparing the two though I realized that it just looks like they blurred one to remove the cracks, as well as cropped it, and the coloration and contrast is way different than the other and it’s even a bit rotated too! I now know that I need to seek out a bunch of photos of a famous piece of art since they can be wildly different.

Even though the drawing is pretty simple, it took a while to get her to look the same, she kept looking older in my version. The original is kinda odd, especially the nose and the right eye. I noticed that the original looks really strange when you look at it in a mirror. This is the first master-level painting that I have seen that looks weird when viewed in that way, every other one I have tried looks perfect in a mirror.

Partly because the original is so cracked and it’s hard to see some details, I am deviating in many respects from the original. I’m basically duplicating the form of the painting but partly in my own style. One thing that is awesome about this is that her gaze really follows you around the room, it’s rather eerie.

I did the face and skin in a raw umber dead layer underpainting first. Once I was satisfied with that, after many sessions and many hours, I started glazing transparent combinations of yellow ochre, burnt umber, and vermillion (hue) over the dry underpainting. The background was also painted with a few layers of glazed burnt sienna and burnt umber.

I still have a ways to go on this one. The decorative band around the hat has been very difficult, but I think I am close to figuring out how to do it.

*Update: For the completed painting see: http://www.chromaticblack.com/completed/petrus-christus-study-completed-portrait-of-a-young-lady

Categories: master study, oil painting, portrait, work-in-progress by Airn
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