50 Artists & Illustrators
MASTER TECHNIQUES
decisions you’ve opted out of. Could
you make the paint yourself? Could
you modify how it looks, spreads or
dries? Why are you only choosing to
paint on a white surface? Is a brush
or knife the best tool for the way you
want to paint?
If the great virtue of study is to see
a familiar process through new eyes,
the greater virtue of practical study is
to both see and experience it. So, for
this series of four articles, I’d like to
get you familiar with a different way of
seeing painting: through indirect eyes.WHAT IS “INDIRECT”
PAINTING?
Most contemporary and almost all
untrained painters work directly.
Most trained painters, and almost
all old masters work indirectly, so
it seems sensible to start this series
by questioning that.Indirect painting simply means
creating a work in stages or layers,
one after – and over – the other. This
in turn means that each layer has to
be made in reference to both what it
is painted over, and what will
subsequently be painted over it.
This sounds straightforward – and
can be – however indirect working
requires you to consider in advance
the sequence you work in, exploit the
possibilities you create, and stay
focused on creating a punchy image.
If you intend to work in several
layers, it’s important to ensure that
they are orchestrated and work
together, rather than negating each
other. The aim here is to make each
stage necessary for, and useful to,
the next one. Every artist develops
their own way of working but here’s
a a typical indirect working sequence
for you to use as a basis:- Prepare an imprimatura – an initial
colour stain on the ground - Block in an underpainting to place
the key elements - Refine the underpainting by
modelling the lines and forms - Add nuance to that modelling with
layers of glazing or scumbling - Give the whole painting a final
unifying layer of varnish
Within these five basic steps, the
emphasis one puts on each stage
may vary enormously, and stages
might be swapped around, duplicated,
redone or omitted as appropriate to
each new painting. The only constants
here are that the work is thought of
as being a piece to be developed, and
to be done so optically.
Most contemporary painters who
are very happy to work intuitively,
spontaneously and from the gut – just
don’t imagine the Old Masters doing it
that way. While modern levels of
spontaneity just weren’t applicable
before pre-prepared tube paints were
available, a quick glance at a Turner,
late Titian, Rembrandt or El Greco will
convince any practicing artist that
spontaneity was part and parcel of
indirect technique, but here’s the
thing – it was planned spontaneity.
Many of the Old Masters
understood the value of the
serendipitous and spontaneous, but
also had the skills to harness that
element of chance – not merely
become a recipient of it.CONSIDERING OPTICS
As I mentioned earlier, because
indirect painting involves layers, it’s
vital to ensure that each subsequent
layer works with the previous one
rather than just obliterating it. This
means that to successfully work in an
indirect way you have to ensure your
paint runs the gamut of opacity from
fully opaque, through milky turbidity,
to glass-like translucency.
This sounds complex, but it really
isn’t. If you squeeze out a bit of
Titanium White – an opaque pigment- and spread it out it with your finger
it will appear thinner and less
opaque; dilute it with a dash of
solvent and it will become translucent.
Paint mediums make all of this more
nuanced, but they are simply different
means to the same end.
BELOW Martin
Kinnear, Council
House Days
(detail), oil on
board, 244x122cm
“These indirect
textures make for
fantastic interest
up close”