One of the reasons why oil paints remain a popular fine art tool is because they stay beautiful for hundreds of years allowing us to appreciate the work of masters such as Leonardo da Vinci. One of the techniques that Leonardo used in his paintings was oil glazing.
Oil glazing is a method of adding color over an area on a painting in thin translucent layers. Light goes through the layers and reflects back to the viewer allowing atmospheric effects to be created such as you see in the Mona Lisa. There is a soft glow about that painting that is called sfumato, attributed to being invented by Leonardo and is made possible by oil glazing.
To understand the difference perhaps it is best to think of a painter that did not use oil glazes, such as Vincent van Gogh. His paint was applied in pure strokes, he did not add layers of color over those strokes.
To create an oil glaze there are many recipes but they essentially require you to thin your oil paint so you can add a thin layer of pigment over the area on the canvas and once dry you can add another.
This is what I use (and if you are not an experienced painter aware of all the safety rules be very careful as oil painting mediums can be very toxic, always have a well ventilated room and wear gloves when mixing chemicals)
1: squeeze paint from the tube into a mason jar (close jar tightly when finished and it stays good for weeks)
2: add a little turpentine or glaze medium and mix until the paint is liquid
3: for light colors add a little pale drying oil for dark colors add japan dryer or cobalt dryer
4: add damaar varnish until the consistancy is thick enough to not run off the areas you put it on
It is not recommended to mix too many oil painting chemicals together but this works for me.
below are some examples of paintings I have used oil glazes on.
"The Girls Daydream" here you can see that i removed some of the purple oil glaze with paint thinner to reveal to pale yellow below.
"Baby red dragon" the red is oil glazes but the green is not, see the difference?
"The tree of life" this huge canvas is still in progress but you can see some of the oil glazing techniques here, the dark blue is an oil glaze. I flicked paint thinner onto the glaze when it was still wet and it made some interesting textures (look at the bottom of the tree and see that the oil glaze was added over the green). The white paint was added over the oil glaze after it had dried allowing for even more effects.
Good luck my fellow artists!
Oil glazing is a method of adding color over an area on a painting in thin translucent layers. Light goes through the layers and reflects back to the viewer allowing atmospheric effects to be created such as you see in the Mona Lisa. There is a soft glow about that painting that is called sfumato, attributed to being invented by Leonardo and is made possible by oil glazing.
To understand the difference perhaps it is best to think of a painter that did not use oil glazes, such as Vincent van Gogh. His paint was applied in pure strokes, he did not add layers of color over those strokes.
To create an oil glaze there are many recipes but they essentially require you to thin your oil paint so you can add a thin layer of pigment over the area on the canvas and once dry you can add another.
This is what I use (and if you are not an experienced painter aware of all the safety rules be very careful as oil painting mediums can be very toxic, always have a well ventilated room and wear gloves when mixing chemicals)
1: squeeze paint from the tube into a mason jar (close jar tightly when finished and it stays good for weeks)
2: add a little turpentine or glaze medium and mix until the paint is liquid
3: for light colors add a little pale drying oil for dark colors add japan dryer or cobalt dryer
4: add damaar varnish until the consistancy is thick enough to not run off the areas you put it on
It is not recommended to mix too many oil painting chemicals together but this works for me.
below are some examples of paintings I have used oil glazes on.
"Baby red dragon" the red is oil glazes but the green is not, see the difference?
"The tree of life" this huge canvas is still in progress but you can see some of the oil glazing techniques here, the dark blue is an oil glaze. I flicked paint thinner onto the glaze when it was still wet and it made some interesting textures (look at the bottom of the tree and see that the oil glaze was added over the green). The white paint was added over the oil glaze after it had dried allowing for even more effects.
Comments
Write New Comment ▼
Write New Comment
Sorry! This knol's owner(s) have blocked you from editing, making suggestions, or commenting here.