Ginger Jar

Ginger Jar 16x12 oil on stretched canvas

This painting reminded me of a reference made by an artist whose blog I follow. Her name is Kate Stone, her paintings are wonderful, and her blog is:  Painting Stuff To Look Like Stuff

Kate cites the 80/20 rule, which alludes to the fact that often it's only 20 percent of your painting that makes you drink 80 percent of that bottle of wine. This was one such painting for me. Even though most of it came together swimmingly, it took me AGES to correctly capture the color and texture of the plums. More than once, I almost tossed the whole shebang. For the sake of the 80 percent that was working, however, I soldiered on.

Here are some steps in my struggles along the way:

Sketch in oil

Beginning underpainting

Working on dynamics of all fruit

Color of grapes and plums is too similar 

Plums now too blue, green grapes too vibrant

Green grapes developing, plums still too blue

Ginger Jar finished 16x12 oil on stretched canvas