Category: palette
This collection of articles focuses on different aspects of the painting experience and they document my own art journey. They are broken out into different category pages to help with navigation.
Older posts are shown first.
Meadow Grove Farm - A Limited Palette
by Simon Bland / 05 May 2014
Meadow Grove. 11" x 14" oil on linen panel. 2014 I'm gearing up for the first of my summer shows: Upperville Stable Tour, over Memorial Day weekend and the Western Loudoun Artist Studio Tour the third weekend in June. This latest painting is a landscape that I've been contemplating for a coupl...
Plein Air With An Experimental Palette
by Simon Bland / 04 Nov 2014
Weatherlea Plein Air. 9x12, oil on linen panel. 2014 A plein air painting done at Weatherlea Farm in Lovettsville, VA. I used a palette consisting of ultramarine blue, alizarin crimson, cadmium orange and cadmium yellow medium, which is an unusual palette for me as the colors are all very stro...
Color Design Using a Sub Set of the Palette
by Simon Bland / 12 Nov 2014
Color chart for secondary and tertiary mixtures of phthalo blue, alizarin permanent, cad orange, cad yellow medium Sometimes when preparing to start a painting I have to put more thought than usual into the selection of colors. I've just started a small figurative painting of a child ...
Some Fall Studies - Exploring Color in the Fall Landscape
by Simon Bland / 03 Nov 2016
Fall Study I. 5x10, oil on linen panel. 2016 Fall Study 2. 5x10, oil on linen panel. 2016 These are a couple of studies I've done to explore some ideas for a new painting. I'm trying to create something that will fit a frame that's currently on an older, unsold work. Since I had some opportunity to...
Avoiding Muddy Colors in a Plein Air Painting
by Simon Bland / 22 Apr 2017
The spring finally caught up with me today and I got outside for my first plein air event of the year. I painted with the Plein Air Painters of Washington at Washington Park Arboretum. ...
Use an Analogous Color Scheme for Black and White Subjects
by Simon Bland / 08 Sep 2017
Animals with black and white coloration are the hardest of all to paint. In this blog post I show some techniques for making them easier to handle....
How to Paint Green Landscapes
by Simon Bland / 18 Dec 2017
In this blog post I show some ways to paint landscapes without using out-of-the-tube greens and some strategies for using greens more effectively. I will try to answer the question: "What are the best oil colors for landscape painting?" ...
Product Review: Gamblin FastMatte
by Simon Bland / 25 Feb 2020
In this blog post I explain how to use Gamblin Fast Matte and why I think it's an essential part of my paint box....