So the focus on this painting now is to continue to work in black and white while at the same time correcting drawing, increasing detail, and dialing in the values so their relative nature matches the still life while at the same time working with the mood of the painting.
I tend to work with very thin paint. I’m not using medium to thin the paint down I just work with very little paint on my brush and after looking at all of my favorite artists it has become apparent that I must work thicker. So as not to use up too much of my expensive paints I pulled out some Wintons. I used a raw umber and french ultramarine to make the black that I mixed with a winton titanium white. I squeezed out a ton of paint on my palette and I tried to paint a thick as possible. I have to say painting thick like this is much better, I even looked at a painting I did a few days ago where I was going as thick as I could and its really nice, I love the impasto.
I spent most of my time on the elephant candle holder on the left. I had to redraw it once as it was too big, and I worked deeper into its values. But I also worked a lot on the background. I wanted to try an do something interesting with the texture of the background but everything I tried was competing too much with the objects so I used a chip brush to soften all the edges in it and push it back. Tomorrow I will work into the three major objects and dial in their detail and values.
The Setup
