Hello Julian, I like your work. But one thing disturbs me: If your Sky is cloudless, for me it tends too much towards green, or sometimes it's kind of grey. Maybe you use the wrong colors? You told us that, besides ultramarine, your blue colors are phthalo blue and cerulean blue. Both are probably based on the organic Pigment BP 15. (link to Kremer pigments PDF)
I find cobalt blue irreplaceable, much more beautiful and fitting for a sky ( link to Kremer Cobalt Blue).
I hope You find time for a answer.
per, I use many blues and cut or mix them with many things including black, burnt umber, burnt sienna, and various reds and yellows depending on the effect I wish to create. At this time of year - which is maybe the paintings you refer to - the sky can be as clear as a bell and so blue it hurts. It is however still cold and this is the effect I am trying to create. The blue in the actual painting runs from a greenish cobalt to a pinkish grey but obviously what you see will depend on your monitor.
You're wrong about the pigments I use; French Ultramarine which is made from PB29, Phthalo lake PB15.3 and Cerulean PB 36. I do also use Cobalt blue PB28 but I don't find it irreplaceable; I don't like it in mixes, I find it has a weak tinting strength and I find a mixture of Cerulean and Ultramarine gives much the same blue. Micheal Harding is the colorman I prefer though I also use Old Holland and some W&N.
And please feel free to link to your paintings when you leave a comment.
Surely, representational paintings are intended to convey what we see and also how we choose to interpret our vision. I think Matisse got it right when someone said of one of his paintings, "It doesn't look like a woman." Matisse replied, "It's not a woman, it's a painting". So your sky is ok with me.
Hello hillbilly,
Well, that's the problem with me. I don't see green in skys (Maybe it is my monitor). But I should repeat: I very much enjoy looking at these masterful paintings.
The comments concerning the pigments in your painting were interesting. I have been painting since the 1950's and have found the colors in the sky are very different depending on location and time of day. For example the sky colors in my early outdoor paintings in the midwest and southwest were very different than what I see today in the southeast and the Gulf of Mexico. This is how I see it but others may see it differently.
Yes that's a very nice quote hillbilly, it is a painting and not an attempt to represent nature. I can't imagine any painter disagreeing with Derald and then add to that variation the artists subjective response to the light and what he sees in front of him and the need to interpret and create a painting from that - paintings are more of an analogy than a representation.
Well, yes, I can see there are no links yet provided that show us what paintings should look like when painted with THE RIGHT COLORS! (To be voiced with vociferous exuberance!) Perchance it is not the monitor gone tilt here. In any event, do continue using all the WRONG COLORS, Julian. Who knows, it may well turn out rather nicely for you in the end after all...
It's not only monitors which change colours.
The one thing I've found from travelling around the world is that skies are different colours in different places - and certainly vary as well with the seasons as Julian indicates.
If a painting is a representation then my own personal opinion is that if you want to comment on what colours somebody is using or should be using it's really best to to be standing next to them looking at the sky they are looking at.
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I find cobalt blue irreplaceable, much more beautiful and fitting for a sky ( link to Kremer Cobalt Blue).
I hope You find time for a answer.
(Comment edited by Julian)
You're wrong about the pigments I use; French Ultramarine which is made from PB29, Phthalo lake PB15.3 and Cerulean PB 36. I do also use Cobalt blue PB28 but I don't find it irreplaceable; I don't like it in mixes, I find it has a weak tinting strength and I find a mixture of Cerulean and Ultramarine gives much the same blue. Micheal Harding is the colorman I prefer though I also use Old Holland and some W&N.
And please feel free to link to your paintings when you leave a comment.