"Yellow Bowl of Cherries" 6x6

"Yellow Bowl of Cherries" 6x6 SOLD

On a roll now with my color studies. My work seems to be taking on a different direction, one with looser markmaking, broken color and lack of definite detail. I've struggled for years to get my work to break from pure photographic realism believing that art should look like it is art, not a photo. With these broken color studies, I'm finding so much more joy out of the process. Here, I have taken a reference photo from the Reference Image Library from WetCanvas, posted by Rosemarie. I was struck by the cool light coming in from outside and the mix of cherry varieties in this little bowl. As usual, I have posted my painting process. Comments welcome below.


First, I started with an underpainting of Createx paint in the complimentary colors of the intended piece. I'm not paying attention to the values of the underpainting like I should have. You may notice there is some ghosting in this underpainting and that is because I've re-used a previous project and am painting over it. I guess one could say I'm being green...


This is the "ugly stage". At this step, I'm establishing my values, but not all of them are placed. It's a process I go through, juggling the values all the time. My main objective at this stage was to get the "light" right from the window, hoping to establish a mood early on.


Filling in color, and correcting as I go. I like the dark cherries, but have so much more to do.


Wow! That pop of red really screams! I'm noticing trouble with the shadow of the bowl. Because a cool light dictates a warm shadow, I"m not necessarily following that rule here. I'm not so sure it's working for me. I will let value dictate over color here. Don't want to over work it, keeping the fresh feeling of broken color.


Details, but not too much! Just enough to keep it alive!
Now...go eat a cherry!