June 1 - Continuing with the Acrylic Still Life

I'm still covering the canvas using only the cool colors--the whites you see are the canvas itself, which flies in the face of my normal procedure of toning the canvas. But since the source material is so harmonious and subtle in coloration, I wanted to use the whate canvas to "keep the sparkle" as I continue to develop the shapes.

Yes, not a BIT of warm in here yet, and the harmonies of color are really pleasant. I'm using the "Trifecta" of the sky trio with white to create all those areas of gray variations. All you Color Boot Camp Graduates will know those!

On the rest of the canvas, I'm just putting in the general shapes of the things--such as the grapes and the plate shadows. There is a bit of pure on the vase now, in the shadows on the left. Ultramarine and white. It looks so warm and advancing because with the Color System, if you use a cool color solo with just white added, and surround it with other cool mixes that have two or three others combined, there's an optical illusion created. That illusion makes the purer colors advance, and appear warmer. Can you see it?

On other news, I'm clearing out the workroom for the June COLOR BOOT CAMP here this coming weekend. Twelve people are going to fill their heads and canvases with the time of day system that seems to be revolutionizing painting for people who want good color, every time.

I'm putting in a white picket fence around my rose garden this week--here's an image of it in process. OK, all the stereotypes about "houses with white picket fences" come to mind, but I've always loved pickets and roses, and now I have both right outside my studio windows. Life is good. But then we also have a swarm of bees that came into the back yard this afternoon, so maybe not. A local beekeeper is coming by this evening to take them for his hives. That's the best for the bees, and they'll be gone before they can get hungry and testy.

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