Thursday, January 28, 2016

Mrs Butterworth and Friends

Mrs Butterworth and Friends, 20x20" oil, Diane Mannion

Slow Painting

After finishing field study landscapes in a few hours, it's difficult making the transition to studio work where time moves in slow motion.  Large studio paintings can take days, weeks or months to finish.  

Other techniques come into play.  Slow painting allows glazing, wet over dry, wet into wet, scraping, and making endless changes.  The problem is losing patience and calling it finished before it's well... done or polished.
Also my critic friends' opinions!  Thought this painting was finished until suggestions were made to push it a bit farther and define a few spots more carefully.  A painting has to please more than me! Writers want their novels read, composers want their music heard, and I want my paintings seen not just by me.  I am also my toughest critic.

Mrs Butterworth and Friends went through many changes!  Worked outside, inside, and from imagination trying to wrestle this one into a painting that works.  Flowers and glass were the most fun but  orchestrating the backlit arrangement to form dynamic and cohesive patterns was the most difficult.  Varied the paint application from thin to thick, creamy and buttery.  Sweet! 
The first stage felt too boxed in and needed something else going on in the foreground.  Easy to see how many changes I made, and I'm glad I did.  Also glad I listened to my critics.
 Found the vintage Mrs Butterworth and her sake bottle buddy in an antique shop.  They've been hanging around my studio for years waiting for me to paint them (and may have to wait a few more years for me to paint them again). 

8 comments:

Wendy Barrett said...

I absolutely love this painting Diane! The translucence of the bottles and the shadows and play of light is divine! Simply gorgeous!

Diane Mannion said...

Thank you so much, Wendy! Don't know if they have Mrs Butterworth pancake syrup in Australia? But so glad you like my painting.
Diane

Catharina Engberg said...

The glass looks great!

Diane Mannion said...

Thanks, Catharina! Glass and flowers are fun to paint, backgrounds... not so much.

Wendy Barrett said...

I have never heard of the brand Diane - or seen those bottles before.

Diane Mannion said...

Wendy Barrett, can tell you live in Australia! Very famous here in the States, Mrs Butterworth, a maple syrup bottle (now plastic, mine is vintage glass... maybe about 40 years old). The green bottle is, I think, a Sake bottle, also vintage, found both in an antique shop.

Wendy Barrett said...

How wonderful to have a vintage glass version of the iconic bottle! I love old glass bottles!

juliefordoliver.blogspot.com said...

OMG - what a difference! Pat on the back for staying with it and listening to your friends. It glows with light...and the shadows are wonderful!