Apple from Liz Wiltzen’s workshop

This weekend I am lucky to be in a Calgary FCA workshop with accomplished painter Liz Wiltzen.  We’re painting in oils and concentrated on value, color, and intensity today with several exercises.  The goal of the workshop is to concentrate on observing these things carefully, putting down the “true” colors.  Once that has been mastered, an artist can move on to their chosen path wherever they want to be on the realism --- abstraction spectrum. 

For the last 90 minutes we worked up our own small [6”x8”] still life.  I brought an apple that was striated red/green – what a nasty thing that was to paint!  The color was difficult due to the complimentary nature of red/green.  Every time I made a stroke it changed EVERYTHING!  I was reasonably happy with the way it turned out despite running out of time.  The background color was challenging and I’ve made it just a tad too cool in the painting.  More practice tomorrow.  Have a great weekend!