Landscape painting is one of the genres most popular with both art collectors and artists/students. Looking back at history of arts we observe that actually landscape painting was introduced and started being a subject matter very recently. Before that, paintings mostly depicted the human figure in various ways including as part of mythological or religious/biblical stories. Leonardo da Vinci was one of the first to introduce the landscape as a background for his famous painting of the Mona Lisa. From there onwards artists also started to go out and use sketching/drawing as a way to record what they observe and then translate those sketches into a studio painting. Later on as paint tubes were developed life became a little bit easier and artists such as Monet and other impressionists started painting more outdoors. 

If still life painting is fundamentally important for those who want to learn how to draw and paint realism, without doubt that outdoor painting is same as important to learn to paint the landscape. It is very difficult for a person who never observed with his/her own eyes sceneries away from city life, to conceive the vast space and effects of the light and weather on the landscape. These skills one cannot get them from using photography only as reference material. Photography is a good tool but only when its used in combination with other sources including your observation of reality. The hardest issue when painting outdoors is the constant change in light intensity, direction and colour. This issue will force you to paint faster and to make fast decisions about colour mixes. 

On a recent trip to Kangaroo Valley , while staying at a very interesting property at Barrengarry (Bedford and Bunker) I took the opportunity to paint a number of sketches of the farm land and surrounding scenery at different times in the afternoon. As my setup I used a pochade box with a glass palette, 12 x 9 inch Ampersand boards to which I attached a piece of linen double primed with a non-absorbent acrylic primer (Michael Harding). The palette of colours used was ultramarine blue, phthalo blue, Venetian red, Pyrrole rubine (PR264), yellow ochre, cadmium lemon, viridian and flake white replacement. Cold pressed linseed oil was used as medium when needed. One of the most important issues when painting outdoors has to do with your position in relation to the sun. The worst that can happen to you will find a place in the shade and within an hour you end up with the sun on your canvas in such a way that you cannot see anything. I usually also wear a hat with a wide brim or a cap to prevent constriction of my eyes due to the bright light which will not allow you to see and judge values well. Before I start painting I always spend a significant amount of time observing in which direction the sun is going to move across the sky as well as the landscape around me in order to decide my subject matter and make some decisions about the composition of the painting. To help you with the issue of the sun, there are a number of very useful tools that can calculate for you the position of the sun and shadows even at different days and times such as Sun Calc. 

During these two sittings I finished two paintings (shown in the images above) one early afternoon and the other an hour before sunset. I always try to finish the entire painting within a maximum of one and a half hours. I also took a number of photos especially at sunset when the light will be changing literally every minute and so its very difficult to capture the light in paint. Another tool I use is my memory. I try to sit and observe in order to memorise what I am seeing as well as the whole experience and atmosphere which consists of not only the visual sense but also the sensations from other senses. Using this combination of tools I am now working on a bigger studio painting of this location.
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Today I am going to give a brief overview of the painting process of this painting. I found the subject matter interesting in a number of ways. The human figure looks like he is a meditative and reflective state while at the same time there seems to be a friendly and peaceful relationship with the monkey. It also reminded me of when I was young and I had this obsession that I wanted a small monkey as a pet, however this never happened. It also reminded me of our connection as humans with mother nature and especially with the other creatures with whom we share our life on this planet. It is also a reminder that we are part of the natural world from which we all are coming. 

From the artistic perspective I loved the combination of colours and contrasts. The background is fairly neautral leaning towards a low chroma orange which contrasts with the relatively high chroma complementary bluish tones of the turban. Other complementary contrasts are red/green and yellow/purple.

As a surface I prepared a stretched fine linen, primed with three layers of acrylic primer. The initial tonal sketch was done using raw umber which was allowed to dry for a day and then painted over with a second layer of transparent red oxide red. Both of these paints dry very quickly.

After allowing the painting to dry for couple of days I proceeded to the next layer of paint, where I started introducing more colour and opaque paint. A 50% cold pressed linseed oil was used as medium and added to the paint. After identifying the colour groups, an mid-range colour was initially mixed and adjusted to create a tonal variation of that colour suitable to use for shadows and light. The darker but warm underpaint helped me to establish and control the tone as well as for the darker areas in the shadows.

The last stage was focused to continue modifying the tones in each section of the painting, usually darkening the shadows and lightening where needed. During this stage both scumbling (for opaque paint) and glazing (using transparent paint) are used to continue adjusting the tones while creating more form.

The painting is currently in its final stages where I might do some minor and final adjustments before signing it.