I want to write a little about my technique of painting. Painting dark to light is not unusual when using acrylics or oils. You can experiment with various tones of ground (the colour you paint out your canvas before starting to develope your picture) For example some portrait painters like to use various tones of grey as a ground. In the finished painting glimpses of the ground will be seen in the skin tones.Personally i favour a mixture of burnt sienna and aquamarine. These grounds can become the signature of the artist and makes there work instantly recognisable. I discovered by trial and error that working from dark to light was the way to go for me most of the time. I recently tried painting a portrait from light to dark and found it a real challenge and quickly reverted back to what i know and was satisfied with the end result. I look it like this.. When the sun comes up in the morning it slowely throws light on the earth, long shadows appear getting shorter all the time as it gets higher in the sky. Eventually everything is flooded in light. Thats basically what i’m doing . Adding sunlight to my paintings and have the excitement of seeing a world appear that once was cloaked in darkness.
