Sunday, January 22, 2017

Glass Process

I know how daunting painting colored glass can be.
You must take into account reflections, refractions, color, value and texture all in a small space.
I just started painting glass a couple of years ago and after much trial and error I managed to self teach my own process for this complicated subject.
I pushed through because I love it so much.

There are as many ways to do this as there are artists at work and glass to study.

Here is just one method that works for me.


Begin with a simple contour drawing.
Within each bottle more contour drawings to map out
significant value changes.
Use liquid mask to cover white highlughts and the lightest value.
I use W&N Colourless Art Masking Fluid.


Glaze in your medium and dark values.
You are looking for the appearance of transparency here so vary the colors you choose.
Here I am using M. Graham Watercolors in 
Perm alizarin crimson, Naphthol red and Scarlet Pyrrol 
while picking up some yellow or purple to vary the lights and darks.


Remove the mask.
Ugh! It's always a bit of a shock to see all that white after 
laying in all those beautiful colors.
Now is where the real challenge begins.

Glaze in lightest, brightest color and begin the process of glazing in more color,
picking up hightlights and glazing again as you move through the piece.
This is not finished yet but at this point I stop and move onto the next one.
Once the whole painting is filled in I spend another day carefully
looking for tweeks usually by picking up color here and laying in there.

This is a large piece with lots of bottles.
I should finish it this week.
And its all worth it in the end.
The process is the thing for me and I'm always sorry to see it end.

I find my vintage bottles in my favorite thrift store and antique shops.
And when they are not sitting for a painting they are sitting pretty in my windows.

I'll be back soon with the reveal of the finished painting.



4 comments:

  1. Thank you for the beautiful explanation Carmella! The reds in the bottle are so rich, gorgeous painting so far!!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you Celia. I learned by watching lots of Paul Jackson and Soon Warren iTune videos.
      I'd love to take a workshop with one of these artists someday!

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  2. Thank you for your generosity in describing your process. It's looking good now & the reveal will be worth the wait!

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    Replies
    1. Thanks so much Chris. I have so many of these bottles scattered around my house that I'm constantly thinking of new ways to use them. The way they seem to self illuminate just gets me every time.

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