"horse, lakota artist": intermediary and finishing steps

next steps

while looking at this painting and its status to date i realized that there wasn't too much more to do; perhaps an hour or so. since i had decided that this would be a flat wash background in large part very early on i knew that i couldn't avoid doing something about it very much longer. taking the "bull by the horns" i mixed up a small puddle of raw sienna/raw umber/yellow ocher ( not sure how much of each as i have them all in the same well on my palette) and taking my 1" flat sable brush i started in the upper left. i painted a flat wash using the usual technique of working across the paper leaving a bead of paint at the bottom and then picking it up on the next swipe. as i moved down the sheet i varied the ratio of the three colors and even added another yellow (quinacridone gold) down near and over onto the jacket. when this was done i had covered all the background and jacket with more of less the same color(s).  while that dried i worked on the tuft of hair in his pony tail at the back of his head using ultramarine blue and burnt umber. you are familiar with my ubiquitous scraping by now. the hat was next using ultramarine blue, brown madder, and mineral violet and a #10 round sable. by this time the background/jacket wash had dried and i put in the rest of the colors (ultramarine blue/burnt umber) and the cast show from the *left* collar with burnt umber/quinacridone gold and a touch of blue. the t-shirt was the same mixture and put down as a flat wash. i thought that the *left* cheek needed a bit more shadow so i strengthened and enlarged that with the same flesh colors as before. now that i see it here i think i was a bit exuberant, but will leave it as i think only a mess would result if i stated fooling with it.

"horse, lakota artist" 20"X16"

i defined the upper back with a negative shape of some dark value of neutral grayish color and blended it into his hair and collar. some texturing, folds, and collar seam on the t-shirt was next with just darker values of the same colors. likewise for the folds and shadows on his jacket but with the burnt umber/quinacridone gold/blue paint. he has rather severe acne scarring which i tried to represent by the spatters on his face and although i like them i don't know if they really do look like scars or freckles.a few more touches on the face that were really fussing to the max and were only serving to make it look more rigid rather than better so i forced myself to stop that nonsense. lastly, i thought that the composition needed something along the left edge so i painted a long rectangle (stripe) of the face colors from top to bottom . i wish i had softened some of the edges  but all in all i think it did what i wanted.

 i am beginning to like working on this hot press finish and the resultant wet, watery, raw look that  it produces. indeed it is harder to get blending, but unless someone has a technique special to this paper i think that is the nature of the beast. love it of leave it!  here is the finished version of a talented lakota artist thurman horse (website with some of his work). when i next journey to pine ridge i will take a print out for him.