MASTERCLASS
3 Establish tones
I always do a tonal underpainting first, as it
helps to fix in my mind how I want the lighting
and composition to work. Using the same mix
of Burnt Sienna and Winsor Violet thinned
with Liquin, I roughly applied it with a rag.
While doing so, I decided only to have three
areas of light in the picture: the moon, the lit
pavement and the light in the passageway.
After some deliberation I settled on the
placement of the moon and erased it from
the sky tone with an index finger covered
with the rag dipped in clean turpentine.
6 Warm up contrasts
It was time to make a start on the warmly-lit
areas so that I knew what to do with the
areas in shadow that were picked out by the
blue moonlight. The blues had looked a bit
less saturated than I intended so far, but I
knew that it would look richer in comparison
when I washed a complementary orange over
the lit areas. I used washes of Yellow Lake
Deep, Permanent Orange and Burnt Sienna
applied with a flat brush.
If you want to make an area of a painting
more colourful, paint that colour’s
complementary next or near to it. Each
colour will make the other appear more
saturated. This works just as well if you are
using relatively subtle and desaturated
colours too.
4 Deepen contrasts
The initial underpainting wasn’t deep enough
so I gave it another coat. This is a vital stage
of a picture as it gives you chance to adjust
the composition without a lot of repainting.
A warm underpainting colour like this also
sits very well below the dark blues I planned
to use because they are complementary
colours. Little bits of the underpainting will
show through subsequent layers to help unify
the whole painting. I also retained more
detail in these initial stages than I planned to
leave in the final painting. Doing it this way
means I have the option of deciding as I go
what I want to develop and what I want to
leave out. This is an artist’s prerogative and
something you should exercise.5 Block in colour
I wanted the painting to be based on a
blue-orange colour complementary, so the
sky was blocked in with a mix of Prussian
Blue, Permanent Orange and Zinc White with
a touch of Lead Tin Yellow Lemon for the
moon. Permanent Orange helped desaturate
the Prussian Blue.
I blocked in the furthest buildings as
silhouettes, leaving a few gaps where the
underpainting showed through to suggest
lights in windows and break up the
uniformity. I also started to block in the
windows and architectural details with
Prussian Blue and Permanent Orange. Most
would be painted over but I wanted some to
show through, deciding which ones as I went.7 Add texture
With warm colours washed in, I could go back to the buildings in shadow. I wanted them to
pick up the blue of the moonlight without looking too uniform and flat. Venetian façades have
a great variety of stone and brick textures, so I wanted the walls nearest to us to show this.
Working mostly with a flat brush, I dabbed on mixes of Prussian Blue, Ultramarine Blue,
Burnt Sienna and Zinc White over the walls, making sure to lose some of the edges against the
sky. (I used Zinc White as it is a semi-transparent white and I didn’t want the lighter accents of
colour to be too opaque as they will stand out too much from the rest of the architecture.)