Impressionistic Acrylics with Palette Knife

Sun kissed garden blossoms.   A snippet from my back patio,  filled with warmth and light.   A hint of summery breezes,  joy filled and so inspiring! They evoke all the loveliness of early summer and with it, the sense of expectancy ….. of what new exciting adventure will tomorrow bring?!

Summery and Light Infused Painting

 

 Acrylic Painting Tips With Palette Knife

My Painting Processes and  Steps

• choose my subject –  sunlit corner of the garden with the sun rays cascading over the roses’  petals
• choose my target theme atmosphere ….      keeping it   Impressionistic,  romantic, soft, abstracted
• choose  my medium     – acrylics   like oils  in their  ‘workability’    with  Golden Open Medium as my “Helper”
• choose my  tools   –  palette knife, will encourage a ‘no fiddle, no fussing about’   approach
• choose my  support  –  hot press paper,  surfaced with gloss medium and let dry completely
• choose my  colours  –   white, naples yellow, permanent rose, permanent alizarin crimson, cobalt teal
• choose my  key –  high key, light infused       loads of light tones to keep it Light and summery, joyful, playful

 

Pretty in Pink Roses  photograph is one of the images from my previous post,  Beauty Blossoms in Many Forms   in which you can see 8 diverse rose photographs.

 

 

Acrylic Painting Tips  – Materials

1. palette knife  pk#1008  –  the best knife I’ve ever used.  sensitive and versatile,  I love it.
2. Golden Open medium  to slow the drying time,  and …. To help with blending the edges,  *very Important!!
3. acrylic paints –   lots of white,  naples yellow, permanent alizarin crimson,  permanent rose, cobalt teal    in    Matisse  or  Golden

 

Why I chose  an abstracted version of the garden blossoms.

I already have done numerous traditional conservative style paintings of flowers and felt like a change, a looser more interactive dialogue.

I’ve been researching Pino Daeni, an Italian artist born 1939 who was quite well known for his fine art oil paintings of women. With exceptional skilled use of design, tone, and a master of edges, I fell in love with his fine art work.

I like where he took his edges. The softness created a gentle romantic feel that I enjoy and feel ‘at home with.’

Some may recognise his style, as he was the artist who created over 3,000 book covers of women’s romance books, until he gave that up!  Pino was the artist who used the model Fabio for his covers.

 

 

Impressionistic  Acrylic Painting  Technique

• I applied the whites and lighter tones towards the top, going a little darker towards the foreground area in order to help with creating some illusion of depth in a nearly abstract design.

• The knife was loaded up and used in 2 major ways:  first to apply paint in flat planes of colour spaces to avoid having everything too busy  and secondly loaded with 2 colours to enhance stroke variation.

• To finish, the permanent alizarin crimson was squeezed out of the tube and dripped (pure paint)  for the final touches.

This is a close up of Summer Garden,  showing how the palette knife creates wonderful flat buttery areas along with delightful and exciting colour variations.

 

 

Reference sources that I’ve used for informational purposes in the post and my painting are:    Collage Techniques A Guide for Artists and Illustrators   by Gerald Brommer   ISBN 08230 06557   Watson Guptill Publications 1994     and   100  Pre  Raphaelite Masterpieces by Gordon Kerr  ISBN 978 0 85775 251 2    Flame Tree Publishing 2011