Michael Pearce

I didn’t get much done today other than to add a glaze layer of transparent iron ozide to the moon, hinting at the cratered surface and the rabbit in the moon.

 

I’m considerably more satisfied with the colour balance of the whole painting now. The moon colour really ties together with the figures. My friend Jonathon Cordero came to visit and reminded me that this crucifixion is a lynching. 

I spent a very productive day in the studio, working on three projects concurrently, so I’ll break the day into three posts. To the crucifixion moon I added a layer of cadmium red mixed with a little black to dirty it down a touch, painting it on then removing nearly all of it with a rag, giving me a nice red tint to the surface of the moon. I’ve yet to add the details of the lunar surface.

Here’s a shot of the first layer of cadmium red over the moon, pretty dramatic. I ended up putting the red over the entire sky, then removing most of it. 

Years ago I worked in a middle sized theatre in Swindon called the Wyvern. I had left art college after a year and was a pretty dreadful painter, certainly not good enough to paint the portrait of George Washington I was asked to make. The painting was awful, but Tony, the resident Designer was kind enough not to jeer at me and throw me out and instead chose to teach me how to age a painting using a wash. He summoned me to the scene dock and as I watched him mix a pot of black paint with a smile he suddenly poured it all over George’s pink face. I nearly fell over! Then he took a rag and lifted the paint away from the image, letting the background drop off into dark shadows, and it was thoroughly aged. I’ve never forgotten the lesson he taught me about painting layers.

While putting the red layer onto the crucifixion and ragging it I almost completely destroyed the not-quite-dry tree branches that overlaid the moon, so I repainted them, then added some red backlight edges to the undersides of the leaves and branches. I worked on revitalizing the crucified victims who needed a bit of refreshing, so I darkened the wood of the crosses and added some highlights onto their flesh.

 

There isn’t much more to do now but to get the details of the moon surface in there, and I  really want to get the face of the third guy in the foreground finished. (That’s Ogre)