A Blog About Oil Painting
Welcome to my blog. Here you'll find me rambling on, unassisted by AI, about all sorts of things related to art in general and oil painting in particular. There's even a recipe for dog cookies hidden away somewhere.
Like the rest of the site, this section is still a work in progress and I will be making it tider and easier to navigate in time. There is a lot of content, so using the buttons below may help you to get around. Newest posts are shown first.
Molly Part 2: The Block In
by Simon Bland / 10 Aug 2015
Molly Block In. 14x11, oil on linen. 2015 This morning I did the block-in for the portrait of Molly. I used a mixture of terra rosa and raw umber applied thinly on an un-toned panel. I will let this dry and then tone the panel before starting the final layers of the painting. I don't usua...
Molly Part 1: Starting With a Low Quality Photograph
by Simon Bland / 07 Aug 2015
Value Design for Molly. Charcoal on a 1/2 sheet of Canson. Artists who take commissions often get asked to work from photos that are a little off and I've seen more than my fair share of cellphone pics taken at night, or prints taken from 50 yards away with a disposable film camera. I'm usually relu...
More Painting at One Trick Farm
by Simon Bland / 04 Aug 2015
Today we returned to One Trick Farm for the second of our two outings there. Fortune smiled on me and I managed to get two small paintings done. White Barn (plein air). 8x10, oil on linen panel. 2015 The first painting I did is of some fields and a barn that were technically on a neighboring ...
Elvis
by Simon Bland / 02 Aug 2015
Elvis. 20x16, oil on linen. 2015. About two weeks ago I thought I was nearly finished with this painting (after a couple of earlier re-starts) when I realized that the overall color scheme wasn't working. I went back and redesigned the whole thing over again. The figure turned out to be mostly...
Painting at One Trick Farm
by Simon Bland / 28 Jul 2015
One Trick Farm (plein air). 8x10, oil on linen. 2015. Today's paint out was in Hillsboro, VA. It was one of those days when I wished I carried a large canvas with me as the sky was full of interesting cloud formations. I found a great spot on a mowed pathway in the middle of a field with a large tre...
Buddy - a portrait sketch
by Simon Bland / 25 Jul 2015
Buddy. 12x12, oil on linen panel. 2015 Started the morning by finishing up this painting of Buddy. It was painted using the customer's own photos as a reference. I tried to paint the whole thing in a loose style and integrate the body into the background as much as possible. The palette ...
Hillside Sketch
by Simon Bland / 21 Jul 2015
Hillside Sketch (plein air). 5x7, oil on linen panel. 2015 This plein air sketch was done at a property where the Loudoun Sketch Club had a paint-out. Technically speaking, it was next door to the host's property and I felt a little guilty about leaning over their fence to paint the neighbor's field...
Back to Meadow Grove Farm
by Simon Bland / 21 Jul 2015
Front Field (plein air). 5x7, oil on linen panel. 2015 It was back to Meadow Grove Farm today for a second paint-out. I started with a small sketch to try capturing the cloudy sky and experiment with alternative mixes of green. The grass in front is mixed with Holbein violet gray (like King's Blue) ...
Meadow Grove Farm
by Simon Bland / 14 Jul 2015
Meadow Grove Fields (plein air). 11x14, oil on linen panel. 2015 Meadow Grove Farm in Upperville, VA is one of my favorite paint-out locations: lot of distant views across the fields, animals in abundance, a variety of scenery, trees singular and clustered, and the ever-present Blue Ridge. In ...