White Poodle, day 11!

Oh my goodness, it seems the more I do, the more I see that I have to do... 

Just plugged away at the fur today, but I can't say that I've improved it any. Hopefully, one of these days it will come together!

Today I tried something different - I put my easel on the right, instead of the left! I don't know why I hadn't done this before (see earlier posts). When the easel was on the left, I was turning my head to the right in order to look at the original, and my painting was also in a dark spot. Today, I positioned the easel on the right, and Voila! I was in a more natural, comfortable position where I didn't even have to turn my head to look at the painting, and also, my painting had much more light on it. I was also standing closer, so I could see the details better. Why did it take me eleven visits to figure this out?

I plugged away on the fur, trying very hard to restrain myself and paint each tuft of fur individually. I soon realized that I'd been trying to get these little details with too big of a brush (I think I was using a size "2" filbert - so I switched to the smallest brush I had with me, a size "0" sable round. Made a huge difference! I whittled away at the tail a bit, and will build it back up again next week.

I'm still not very happy, but will I ever be? I keep adjusting the color of the undercoat. Several people gave me their opinions. I listen to everybody and take it all into consideration. I stopped when I realized I was just too tired to think straight anymore.

(click the images for a larger view)

White poodle, day 10

And here I was, thinking I was almost done! As I was walking toward the gallery with my painting in hand, I stopped to chat with an employee of the Museum. He admired my painting, and then remarked that it was "a good start!" I decided to work on it longer...

I was having trouble with the fur. The tufts of fur on my dog were just dabs, as I mentioned last week, whereas Stubbs actually painted each individual tuft. Also, his undercoat varied in color throughout. I took a hard look and decided I just had to paint over all those clumsy dabs, and try again.

Here is a photo a visitor took of me this morning, before I painted over the fur:

After lunch, I worked on the detail in the trees, and then decided to just paint over the fur with the undercoat color. Next week, when it's dry, I will put the tufts of fur back on, hopefully with a more nuanced stroke. Wish me luck!

...at the end of the day today

you can see where I've painted over much of the white fur

...a detail of George Stubbs' masterful fur (sorry, the photo is a little blurry)

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White Poodle, day 9 (not quite done!!!)

I will be coming back next week, to put the finishing touches on this. I think I've got the dog's head as good as it's gonna get. I worked on the fur today, but I think I'll touch it up a bit more. I need to get rid of that shadow area on the back leg. The only major thing left to do is the detail in the tree tops.

I have found out that painting fur is diabolically difficult. I have also found out that I tend to be a "dabber", whereas George Stubbs painted every individual tuft of fur in a unique manner. There is no way that I am going to be able to replicate that, I'm afraid.

(click the images for a larger view)

White Poodle, day 8

Back at the gallery today, missed last week because of the weather. (A tiny bit of iciness in the morning, plus no ride, and yes, I'm a wimp!)

Today I focused on getting the colors closer. I did a lot of glazing - using mostly medium and a tiny bit of color, I painted over most of the painting. I glazed the entire dog with some cadmium yellow, which made his fur much warmer and more like the painting. I went over all the trees with a glaze of burnt sienna, green and a little white (white is opaque, so it was not so much a glaze, which is transparent, as a "scumble"), which served the purpose of not only correcting and lightening the color, but smoothing out the "blobbiness" of the trees that I commented on in my last post. I did the same with the light areas of the boat - a scumble of cad yellow with some burnt seinna and white. I also glazed over the sky and cloud with cadmium yellow. It occurred to me the the painting has probably yellowed with age, but now my copy is a bit closer to the original in color. Worked on the water on the right also.

Then I mixed up a very light, warm color and went back into the dog's fur, painting squiggles. I also mixed the blue-gray color that appears between the squiggles, and the warmer dark that appears between other squiggles. So many squiggles... I worked on the head some - softening edges around the mouth and sharpening and defining the eyes more.

I think it's close to being finished, but of course I am still not happy. The shape of the dog's head in the original is more triangular (pointy head) and mine is more rounded. My dog has thinner hindquarters - I will make his rump fluffier next week. Maybe - maybe - I might be near the end.

(click on the images for a larger view)