Seeking Your Feedback On This Image In Progress…

I decided to experiment with oil painting on a 12"x12" square clayboard panel for an upcoming exhibit. The exhibit will be hung in January 2021 in the lobby of the sports complex in a private community. It is not juried, but it is an exhibit I like to try to participate in each year along with some fellow artists.

For the painting, I used a wonderful reference photo of a Great Horned Owl. As I do with all paintings, I started with a grisaille underpainting. The word "Grisaille" is a fancy word that means a single color. To do a grisaille underpainting, you pick a single color, then paint your entire image, sort of a rough draft. The point of it is to perfect your composition, and capture only the dark and light areas. I used M. Graham transparent red iron oxide (my main "go to" color choice for underpainting, though yellow ochre is a good choice, too). Only after you have gotten the darks and lights and you are satisfied with the image in the grisaille do you begin applying color. You can get some wonderful effects when the underpainting color shows through the colors you use.

For oil painting on clayboard, some people prime the clayboard with gesso, but I did not prime it. I just didn't want to hassle with it because I'm kind of lazy, and when someone else told me it wasn't necessary that was good enough for me.

As I started painting, I was pleased that the paint adhered to the clayboard just fine. I soon found, however, that if I went back over a place I had already painted, my brush would lift pigment from the surface. Aargh! Once I got used to that and adjusted my technique, I began to really enjoy the effects I could get fairly quickly. I also liked the edge control. When I wanted to soften something or lift pigment, I used a paper towel to blend it. I loved the wonderful effects -- it created the just the atmosphere I wanted.

When I was ready to add in some detailing, I decided to help speed the drying by adding some Galkyd Lite to the pigment. Galkyd Lite is a medium you can add to your paint that gives it a gloss and also speeds the drying, that is, when you are painting on canvas. I learned to use Galkyd Lite from one of my favorite oil painters, Chris Groves.

But to my surprise, the Galkyd seemed actually to slow the drying time! For some reason, the Galkyd causes the clayboard surface to stay tacky and difficult to work on for several days. After it finally dries, however, the surface is sleek and smooth. The image almost looks as if it was printed onto the surface.

Once I finished the image, I decided I liked the result so much I decided to keep the painting as a grisaille, except I added only a touch of cad yellow light to the owl's eye.

Before I called it completely finished, I wanted input from an artist whose work I greatly admire. So, I used my i-phone to take a photo of the painting to send him. I could not believe my eyes when I saw the photo. The lamplight in my studio had cast color reflections on the painting that really made it sing. It is an effect that I believe was only possible by virtue of the surface being clayboard, the Galkyd additive in the pigment which made it reflective, and the soft light of my studio.

I think the yellow reflection picks up the yellow in the owl's eye, and the purple in the background gives it nice contrast and drama.

So, should I try to incorporate only those couple of yellow and purple tones in the back ground for some more drama, but leave the rest of the image in Grisaille?  What do you think? Please let me know!