Painting "Mother Walking With Child"

I'm taking a different approach with this painting. I've learned from Lisa Clough that, when working in acrylics, the background should always be painted first and the subject painted over it. This is because, if the subject were painted first, it would be almost impossible to blend around it before the paint dried.

To that end, I'm only worrying about the background right now. I'm pretending that the woman and the kid don't exist at this point.

My plan is to paint the underpainting for the background, then glaze my color over that. Then I will draw the mother and child, paint the underpainting on them and finally glaze color over that.

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I'm creating texture through the use of different size brushes, including a liner brush, to paint lines and shapes, and various shades of gray.

Today is the first day of adding color. After studying my reference photo, I could see that the dominant color of the building was a very pale brownish pink. To make that color, I mixed zinc white, with a little bit of cadmium red deep and burnt umber. I've been glazing this color in light layers over my underpainting.

I added many layers of this color to the painting until it was more or less solid. When I was done, the color was a little uneven, so I went over some of the darker shades with zinc white to even it out a bit.

I added some of my premixed pinkish brown color, to the zinc white that was already on my palette along with some azo orange. I went back and forth mixing both of these until I was satisfied. When I put this color on the canvas, I thought it was still too brown, so I glazed some azo orange over it.

I preceded to glaze more azo orange and my premixed brownish pink mixed with zinc white over these areas. making back and forth strokes with my brush.

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I mixed some of my brownish pink color into some titanium white this time to make it opaque and applied it to one of the orangey brown spots using a small round and a small filbert brush.

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I mixed zinc white and ivory black to make a transparent gray and painted streaks of this color over one of the orangey brown spots. I also mixed a very light gray from titanium white and mars black,and painted patches of this color around the piece. Then I mixed some of my brownish pink color into this color and continued painting patches to increase the stucco effect.

I mixed a darker version of my sheer brownish pink color and glazed it over the last third of the piece going horizontally. Then,I mixed gray from zinc white and ivory black, so it would be transparent, and painted streaks and squiggles of this over the white patches using a small round brush and a liner brush.

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I took some transparent burnt sienna, this time from Liquitex's soft body line, mixed it with a lot more mixing medium than paint, and glazed it over some parts of the last third of the piece, going horizontally. I mixed ivory black, which is a transparent black, with a good amount of matte medium, and glazed it over some parts of the burnt sienna to darken it, while other parts as is.

I'm learning that it's important to use a large enough brush for the area you're working on when trying to glaze. Otherwise, you get an unsightly ring around the area.

For the bottom portion of the lower third, I started by glazing a light transparent gray made by mixing zinc white and ivory black all over. I then mixed a bit more black into my gray, and, using, a small round brush and a liner brush, applied subtle streaks of this color over my glazed light gray. In the middle of doing this, I decided my gray needed to be darker, so I mixed more ivory black into it. I painted subtle streakes of burnt sienna, glazed over with ivory black, and titanium white, finally glazing some light pink over some of the titanium white to blend it into the background.

I glazed more layers of transparent gray and burnt sienna over other parts of the painting, and put in more spots of titanium white using a small round brush.

​I added yet more white spots to the wall and glazed over them with a mix of zinc white and ultramarine blue. I took some of my premixed brownish pink color, mixed into some zinc white, along with transparent burnt sienna and a lot of matte medium, and glazed this color over the bottom third of the wall. Finally I took a liner brush and some transparent burnt sienna and painted subtle lines of this color where it was needed.

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​I noticed that part of the wall in the back need to be darker, so I mixed some transparent gray from zinc white and ivory black and glazed it along part of the area. I mixed more ivory black into this color and used it to strengthen the cracks in the wall. Whenever, I use a liner brush, by the way, I always make sure to roll in around a bit on my palette so there's an even strip of paint going throughout the brush and not a big blob at the end. I also took a liner brush and some trasparent burnt sienna and made some ridges, which I went over with my premixed gray color. I used my liner brush to paint bits of titanium white, the opaque white over the floor area. Finally, I took some zinc white, mixed with matte medium and went over the front of the ridge.

Tonight, I drew my subjects onto the canvas using transfer paper (I have another post explaining how I did that) and started the underpainting. The goal of any underpainting that I do is to bring out  texture and provide depth using value.

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After finishing the underpainting on the subjects I mixed a combination of transparent raw sienna, zinc white, dioxazine purple, quinacridone red and hansa yellow light to make a flesh color. I also mixed quinacridone red and hansa yellow light together to make a transparent orange and mixed that into the paint as well as mixing the quinacridone red and hansa yellow light in individually. I mixed this combination into some matte medium and glazed it all over the mother's face, chest and arm.

​I intend to glaze some quinacridone red over her skin because I can see it looks a bit reddish in the photo.

As promised, I glazed over the womans entire face and  body with quinacridone red. My goal was not to create any obvious redness but to subtly warm up her skin. I alternatively mixed zinc white and ivory black into my base color to make shadows and highlights. After I was done painting the shadow around her eye, though, I didn't like how it looked. I'd faithfully copied my reference photo, in which the woman's eyes are in deep shadow, but in the painting, it looked wrong somehow. I decided to glaze some transparent raw sienna and some quinacridone red over tne shadows around the woman's eyes and as a result, while the shadow is still very dark, it now looks like a part of her face, as opposed to something that was cut out and stuck on.

I could see in the photo that there was some gray in her skin, so I decided to add it by mixing zinc white and ivory black and glazing it around her jawline and chin.

I didn't put much detail in her eyes, since I can't see much in the photo. I just filled in her cornea with a dark grey, that I had leftover from doing the underpainting. I used gray and not white because her eyes are in deep shadow and white would have looked wrong here. I used van dyke brown for her irises and used a liner brush to paint a dot of mars black in each eye for a pupil and a strip of black above each eye to represent eyelashes.

I glazed over her entire mouth with quinacridone red. I alternatively glazed transparent burnt sienna and quinacridone red over the lower half of her bottom lip and upper lip. I also put a highlight, using zinc white, on the last third of her upper lip. 

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​I mixed yellow light hansa and quinacridone red to make a transparent orange and applied it in three or four layers on her tunic.

I mixed transparent burnt sienna into the orange I'd mixed for the woman's tunic and used a small round brush, and then a liner brush to create shadows in the folds. For her scarf and cape, I glazed several layers of ultramarine blue. I glazed a touch of magenta over her tunic to brighten the orange and painted zinc white over part of her scarf to lighten it and emphasize the folds.

I mixed cobalt blue and ultramarine to make  the color that I used to paint her rings.

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I glazed magenta over the her scarf and cape to brighten it. 

For the gauzy bit on her cape, I mixed zinc white and ivory black to make a transparent gray, then using a round brush, painted streaks of grayish purple and blue. I mixed more purple into my grayish purple color, and using a liner brush this time, painted streaks of this color onto the gauze. I mixed a darker gray from zinc white and ivory black, and again using a liner brush, painted a steak of this along the bottom.

For the bottom portion of her cape, I let my underpainting show for the gray in the background. I used a liner brush and painted blue violet on the diamond like pattern. I used deep green permanent, ultramarine blue, and carmine, mixed with titanium white for the three stripes, going from top to bottom. I painted them with a little brush that came in a watercolor kit, but that works for acrylic paint too.

​I glazed zinc white and then hansa yellow light all over her skin to brighten it.

I mixed transparent raw sienna, quinacridone red, hansa yellow, and zinc white to paint the baby's skin. After it was all mixed, I thought it was too dark, so I mixed some purple into it. Purple is the complement to orange, so it tones it down. ​

​I mixed some more of my fleshtone that I'd used for the baby and mixed that into some gray that I made by mixing zinc white and ivory black. I used this color to block in the baby's scalp. Then I mixed some more gray and mixed some van dyke brown that I'd saved into that, and, using a liner brush, I painted on strands of hair. Lastly, I painted on zinc white with a filbert brush.

For the sleeves and hood baby's sweatshirt, I mixed a color that was mostly zinc white with some ultramarine blue, and, using a filbert brush, blocked in where this color went. I added varying degrees of ultramarine to this original color to make the shading for the folds, starting with the  lightest shade, other than the base of course, and going darker.

​I decided the woman's skin needed some adjustments, so I glazed purple to town down the yellow, quinacridone red mixed with green, and transparent raw sienna all over her face and neck. Then I mixed some of my green-red shade into the transparent raw sienna and painted a sideways v on her forehead and a vertical curved line under her left cheekbone.

For the patches on the baby's sweatshirt, I used cadmium yellow medium mixed with titanium white, cadmium red medium, and prussian blue.

After making some adjustments to the baby's leg, here's the finished piece.