Meraki Mustangs - The Creative Process

Meraki Mustangs

I talked in the previous blog about how this painting made the most use of new odorless oil products. As I have painted with larger and larger canvases I have more frequently encountered the problem of watercolors drying to fast. To counter this I have used a mixing medium that slows the drying process. But it also changes how the watercolor behaves. I used that medium for both the sky and the under coating of the foreground in this 22 x 46 inch canvas.

I like the effect liquid watercolors give me especially poured and also how fast a large segment of canvas can be covered.

Sky and foreground poured and mountains and sun completed with watercolor

With the use of salt (varying grain size) and soap and metallic powders floated on a very wet surface a variety of effects and textures can be achieved very quickly. I have been using oil sticks in the foreground of several paintings to enhance textures already begun by dropping paint and salt.

Painting the horse in with watercolor

In past horse pictures I have painted the manes in first but I already knew I wanted to use oil sticks brushed in for the manes. I wanted a more wild look. But at this point I became rather dissatisfied with my horses done in watercolor so the watercolor became an undercoating for the oil I will apply with brush.

Oiled in horses if you will

Oil sticked foreground and oil painted middle ground under horses

Using the oil on the horses and then darkening the ground under and behind them made the horses stand out from the watercolored background. And the use of oil stick on top of the textured watercolor and salt foreground created distance. From this point in the opening picture was a lot of tweaking. Mainly of colors of the horses so they did not over power each other. I also roughed up their legs to give them more a sense of movement. In the picture above I had signed it but not added my signature ravens in yet. There was a bit more tweaking to do.

Became a fan of Binford-Bell Studio and see postings of future work in process.