Ogres Aren't The Only Ones With Layers.

Alright, this is probably going to be immensely boring to most people. But here goes...

I said I would write a post about the process of painting and here it is.

When most people say "painting" these days, they don't mean what they think they mean. There are two types of "painting". The one with which most people are familiar, even if they don't realise it, is called alla prima. That means something like "all at once", it's also called "wet-into-wet" and it is what it says it is. You paint more or less all at once, wet paint up against or over wet paint. Sometimes this is exactly what's needed. Clouds and hair work particularly well alla prima. But it has its problems. It is harder to keep colours clean. It is REALLY EASY to end up with a muddy mess. It looks flat, no matter how thickly you apply the paint. Don't get me wrong. It can be very beautiful. But it is not all there is.

Have you ever looked at a modern attempt to copy an old painting (ie pre-C20th) and thought "the form is right, but something is wrong. It just doesn't look quite right"? That's because the technique is wrong. You'll find, more often than not, that the copy is painted alla prima while the original was painted. Or painted in layers, if you prefer (I don't).

So, "painting". This doesn't have a particular term or phrase because IT CAME FIRST. Sometimes you will hear it called "painting in layers", which is descriptive, and accurate, but irritates me a bit. The Dutch were the first to use oil paints, and they used them as if they were using egg tempera - carefully applied thin layers in very small strokes (egg tempera dries really fast, so you have to work that way). Oil paint takes longer to dry than egg tempera - much longer - so it took some time to perfect the technique. Once the Italians got playing with the stuff there was no stopping them, and Leonardo da Vinci was one of the leading practitioners, perfecting and even at times inventing technique. His oil paintings are still in beautiful condition to this day because of his profound understanding of the medium and the care he took (his frescoes... well, that's another matter. Some things don't wear experimentation well). Interestingly, the Italians did much the same as the Dutch with brush stroke and layering, but they blew it up. Similar number of brush strokes, but larger, bolder. And the paintings got bigger. The early (C15th) Dutch paintings are tiny.

Why does drying time matter? It matters because paint films expand as they dry.

Let me explain.

Actually, let me go back to the start and THEN explain.

To use the painting technique - first you put down an imprimatura. That is, a layer or layers of colour all over your support (be it wood, canvas, whatever). Some people call it a ground. It isn't. The white paint that covers your support , that's the ground.

After the imprimatura is touch dry you put on an underpainting, usually in lead white and burnt umber, ie lights and darks. I tend to do this in two stages - map in the darks and then the next day put in the lights. You use lead white and burnt umber because they both have a very low oil content. They are LEAN paints. They dry quickly.

The images are from a copy I did of JW Waterhouse's "Circe Invidiosa". This is the underpainting

Then you start putting on layers of paint. You do not have to cover the entire painting every time (in fact it's probably better if you don't). Wait for each layer to be touch dry before you apply the next. And make sure that each layer has a higher oil content than the last, either by using a colour that has a higher oil content (a FAT colour - alizarin crimson is a good example), or by adding more oil. It doens't have to be much, just a few drops, but it does have to there. This is called FAT OVER LEAN.

More layers for Circe. Images Megan Hitchens

Which brings us back to drying time. As a paint film dries it expands. Lean paints dry faster than fat paints, but each time you apply a layer of paint you reduce the oxygen getting to the layer beneath and so you slow the drying time of the lower layer. If the paint on top is lean (or leaner) it will finish drying first. The layer underneath will continue to dry and continue to expand. End result - your top layer will crack.

Go to any art gallery and have a good look at the paintings. You will see cracking somewhere. I am not talking about the concentric ring or classic spider web cracking. That is caused by a point of pressure on the canvas and hopefully is only in the varnish (although, sadly, not always). I am talking about the crazy paving style of cracking. You occassionally see it in very old paintings, you see it very often in modern paintings. The idea that you may need some technical aptitude to use oils seems to be anathema these days. It really shouldn't be.

Some colours are transparent (like alizarin crimson), some are opaque, so light travels through the layers in different ways, going through the transparent layers and bouncing back at the opaque layers. No wonder painting looks different to alla prima. No wonder alla prima looks flat - the light comes back from the one level. And this is why it is only painting that will give you that particular sense of luminosity.

"Circe Invidiosa" Megan Hitchens 2010 after JW Waterhouse 1892. Oil on canvas. 180cm x 90cm

There is a trend when painting alla prima to apply the paint thickly in places, to give depth or texture. Couple of problems with that. It can be applied too thickly so that the weight of the paint causes it to slide or fall off the canvas. Also, the top part of the thick paint ends up... cracked. You can guess why.

Thin layers of paint can easily be textured. It is subtle, but once you put a glaze over the top it becomes dramatic. Look at any number of Rembrandts. That beautiful texture he achieves is done thinly (or at least thinly by today's standards).

Notice I have said "touch dry" above. It takes SIX MONTHS for oil paint to fully dry. Six. Months. If you don't want to worry about fat over lean, but you do want to paint, you shall have to wait six months after each layer before applying the next. I think it is simpler and I know it is quicker to just master fat over lean.

I paint. I use alla prima for quick colour studies for reference for paintings, but then I paint. So when I say "process" now you know what I mean.

(There were many more layers for "Circe Invidiosa" than I have shown. There is a series of photos somewhere for one of my original paintings, but I have no idea where it is. So you get my copy of someone else's work. It's a valid way to learn.)