Margret E. Short Fine Arts

Portland, Oregon artist Margret Short - a modern day master of 17th Century Dutch art using the chiaroscuro technique to create still life and floral paintings.

Atmosphere on the Easel

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This is another example of background transparency/translucency that suggests a lot of atmosphere. The brass is glowing through the paint strokes, but it’s not too busy either. Black and burnt umber worked well here.

atmosphere

atmosphere1

Above is a detail of one of the gold leaf paintings. The gold was such a beauitiful passage that it was left unpainted except for a slight bit around the edge of the pitcher. All of the gold above that edging is gold leaf untouched except for the final coats of varnish. I employed a secondary gold leaf technique using medium and gold leaf powder to make a paint that you can see between the blue and white on the left of the pitcher edge.

Chiaroscuro Painting

Oil painting with the chiaroscuro technique illuminates the focus area with a strong light. All other areas are painted with less detail, lower values, and intensity of color giving a mysterious appearance. By putting one or two objects in the important focus area, a strong but simple composition will emerge. Combining these oil painting techniques with a selection of superior natural pigments and oil paints result in the beautiful and evocative quality known as Chiaroscuro Painting.