Build WORKSHOP
STEP 2
Using a piece of sharpened gray pastel, I drew out the
main contours of the putti and drapery. The grid helpedSTEP (^1) me maintain the scale and placement of the shapes.
I selected a paperboard panel, prepared with rabbit-
skin glue into which I’d added raw umber powder. This
broad-brushed coating provided a slightly toothy texture
plus a good mid-tone value to the sizing. I worked from
a digital photograph I took of the overdoor relief sculpture.
With digital tools, I drew a simple linear grid over the
image on my laptop screen. Then, using a red colored
pencil, I replicated the grid at a larger scale on my panel.
STEP 3
With a small painting knife, I created mixtures of
shadow and light colors with black, raw umber,
transparent earth yellow, brown ochre, caput mortuum
and Cremnitz white. I spread the colors with the knife,
providing a thick layer that I could later brush into with
flat watercolor brushes in order to blend areas together.
STEP 4
I continued laying in colors, beginning with shadows in
each area, then half tones between light and shadow,
followed by lights. Noting the marble’s color shifts,
I added a little ultramarine blue to the cooler places
and more Naples yellow in the warmer areas,
attempting to capture the discoloration caused by time
and the urban atmosphere. I didn’t use a medium;
instead I let the surface dry to the normal matte fi nish
and kept working over that, letting the painting take on
some of the dryness of unpolished marble or stone.
36 Artists Magazine May 2020