Over on Instagram I have been sharing my painting journey of my recent commission, a Collie x who is mostly white with black markings. As part of my journey I photograph and often video each stage of my process for the customer so they can see my progress and let me know if they want anything changed etc. It makes the customer inclusive and apart of their paintings journey from photo to canvas it makes the process more special for both of us. on the odd occasion I’m allowed to share the process in real time, this doesn’t happen very often because the portrait might be a gift for someone. I was asked on stories by a few people why I was painting the black patches blue?
Its odd isn’t it when you’ve done something for so long you just do it without thinking. like being on autopilot, and its not until your asked that specific question about why you do what you do that it really hits you, its just an automatic thing for me to paint black pets blue (haha). Saying that It was refreshing to be asked questions about my process because I actually had to stop and really think about it. Its given me the opportunity to see my process in a different light and not to just assume that everyone watching my stories or reading my posts, knows why?! So I wanted to answer the question on my blog to give it the justice it deserves.
Why blue and not black the science behind colour.
Colours that exists around us in objects like an flower, a fruit etc is the result of pigments or molecular colouring agents on the surface of an object (I know I know stay with me on this one, it wont get too heavy!) where the light reflects those molecules, in a painting the colour of an object id made from pigments. Try thinking of it like a rainbow where the sun reflects the colour prisium in the rain drops.
Going back to the blue black conumdrum, firstly black is not a colour its a shade, do you see it in a rainbow? Or white for that matter? Colour is the reflection of light, but many people consider black to be a colour because you have to combine pigments to create it so you can use it on the canvas or paper. Colour expresses light when it hits different surfaces and gives that colour i.e. red, yellow, green etc. So when there is no light you see black (think about the night) True black and white is rare, nothing can be pure white or pure black except a black hole or the darkest of nights! So now I’ve got the science part out the way I can explain why I use blue and not black in my painting. Its important to understand that black is made from mixing the 3 primary colours (colours that can not be made by mixing other colours together) these are Red Blue and Yellow. When you mix these colour together the human eye will see it as black but its not a true jet black.
When it comes to art and painting in particular I was always told that you need to build layers up. Colours and textures give warmth, dimension and emotion to a painting, if I was to paint a dog black you would get a very flat and uninteresting painting, there would be no depth or emotion or life. To give that feeling of life you build it up with blue and as each layer goes on it gets darker, Thus making it “black”! But it still has interest and you can add the textures of the fur etc as you go along.
I really hope this explains why I use blue as my base layers in my paintings.
If you would like to follow my process head over to Instagram www.instagram.com/jofrancesarts
