A step-by-step Impressionist Acrylic Painting – The Final Part 4
I am posting a weekly video on my YouTube channel in this Impressionistic landscape series that you can follow along at home.
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How to paint like Monet – Free video Course |Part 4
This video below is the final part where we refine the whole painting. Balancing clean blocks of colour with more painterly elements.
The next 7 steps
Step #1. Creating a ‘Big Look’.
Often, at this stage of a painting, large quantities of tea are needed!
Having a fresh pair of eyes to reassess how your painting is working as a whole is essential.
I felt there wasn’t a balance between colours for this painting, so I mixed a soft peach colour using Cadmium Yellow Light, a touch of Cadmium Red Light and white.
I move it through in a foreground band towards the bottom of the painting.
Step #2. Blocking in the Lavender Field.
Having stepped back from the painting, I decided to block the purple colour we first started with. This gives us both a contrast in tone and a nice mix between smaller brush marks and larger blocks of colour.
I add a touch of Titanium White to the mix and apply a thick band of paint just below the building. This lighter band helps separate the mid-ground and gives a calming area of colour just beneath the focal point – the farmhouse.
Step #3. Defining the mountains.
Using the hog hairbrush, I mix Titanium white and the tiniest amount of Cobalt Blue. I then blush in a lighter tone to the top edge of the mountain, to blend the white into the sky I use my finger.
Step #4. Balancing the sky.
It’s important when you’re painting in this style not to get too precious about certain areas of your work.
Impressionist style painting is a process of redefining and painting over parts that may have worked well at an earlier stage. As a beginner, this may seem a bit of a tough blow, but most paintings have many hidden layers to them and parts that have been adjusted for the balance of the final piece.
I now add a bit of the purple to the right-hand side of the sky and blend it through with a Cobalt blue and Titanium white to give a subtle effect.
Again, the painting started by using colours from the mountain in the foreground, and now this is bringing the mid-ground colour into the sky.
I continue to bring this powder blue mix back on top of the purple.
It’s a real case of ‘toing and froing’ with a style like this to get the desired effect.
Step #5. Guiding the viewer’s eye.
I now add a muted yellow that has a slightly diagonal line.
This moves the viewer’s eye around the piece rather than having too many strong horizontal lines, it’s a subtle effect, but it really makes a difference.
The return of the double-loaded brush!
If you notice, on my brush, each side has a different colour. I had dipped one side into the lilac mix and then twiddled the brush in my fingers to load up with some of the yellow colour.
I can then paint a more broken colour effect very easily without going back to the palette. This produces a lovely muted tone with the acrylics, often more associated with Oils, as the colours mix in together ‘wet into wet’.
Step #6. Reinstating the mountain.
This little mountain got lost in the painting process, so I’m quickly painting him back in and move a few dots of the blue down the piece.
Step #7. Finishing touches.
Now for the finishing touches, I mix a lovely sunshine orange using Cadmium Red Light, Cadmium Yellow Light and white to add a final ‘wow’ factor to the farmhouse roof – basking in the sunshine!
I move this colour with a few brush marks to the foreground of the piece, they are only little marks but are the finishing touches that bring this piece altogether.
The Final Piece
Now all that’s needed is a large glass of wine and imagine you’re in Provence enjoying the landscape!
You might also like:
1. How to paint like Monet – Lesson 1
2. How to paint like Monet – Lesson 2
3. How to paint like Monet – Lesson 3
