"Saving Cherries"

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"Saving Cherries"

5 x 7 in

Oil on Canvas Panel

I've been so busy lately with other paintings its good to step a way and pump one of these out through out the day.  Especially now since I know with the holiday coming up I won't have time to paint, which means i'll be twitching for a couple days feening to paint.  I was at the grocery store today and could not walk away from these cherries, I guess since spring is here and summer is around the corner they are just everywhere.  Here in Minneapolis spring is short lived because of our long winters sometimes we just jump straight into summer, but everyone once in a while spring pops up and its just beautiful outside.  Thats one of the things I really appreciate living up here is seeing the change of seasons and how beautiful it is, being born and raised in Miami, FL I only know one season summer.  Cherries are always a favorite of mine to paint, their deep reds and smooth surface always brings me back to them.  They are deceiving though they seem simple to paint but they have their challenges, the intense red and subtle value shifts make it tricky to paint.  A good challenge for someone if they want to learn how to paint smooth surfaces and subtle value and chroma shifts.  

I started with the usual dry brush approach using no mediums and just a bit of raw umber on the brush.  After the drawing is complete I start on all the cherries treating them at the same time in each stage, I first  lay in the general colors and try to do some big form modeling.

Then I add darker values and its specific forms and do the same with the lighter values.  In this stage i'm constantly going back and forth between values and adjusting it to the right look i'm going for, I take it to  a close finish and move onto the base.

With the base I start by laying general colors and the fall of light across the base, I'm not worried about details at this stage just getting the overall statement of colors and light.  Once that's working right I start by adding the darker values and its specific forms, I add the middle darker values as well and take both values to a finish.

Then I add the lighter values to the base and take the whole base to a finish.  Once the base is complete i'm able to concentrate on the background, I first start by treating the edges where the cherries meet the background.  I have to be careful in not contaminating my background color with the reds of the cherry, I also play with the softness of edges all around with the cherries and base.  After the background is complete I go back into the cherries and add some finishing touches here and there and take the whole painting to a finish.  That's one of the reasons I like to take the main object I'm painting to a close finish in the beginning, once all the other areas are painted the main object might look different in value and chroma.  Leaving room to adjust certain parts of the painting in the end is a good thing to do, never know if you do or don't need to do it better safe than sorry.  Hope you enjoyed this one, thanks for stopping by!