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.

Greek Pigment Project

Festival of Panathenea is a one-painting project based on 5th century BCE Greek culture and pigments.

Knucklebones

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 In ancient Greece, a popular game played by adults and children alike was called astragali or knucklebones. The dried ankle bones of sheep were perfect for this because they have four sides - one flat, one concave, one convex, and one with a sinuous side. A value was placed on each of the differing sides. Two or more players toss the bones in the … [Read more...] about Knucklebones

Uber Umber

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There are several colors I could not do without on my palette. This is a splendid very dark burnt umber from Cypress. It is very dark almost black with a warm undertone and is easy to make. There are many versions of this pigment, but this dark one is my favorite. One terrific and useful characteristic of this pigment is the drying quality; … [Read more...] about Uber Umber

Challenges

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Many attempts and many methods were tried and aborted before this beautiful surface was achieved on my painting, shown above. Initially, I used a wet on wet technique by applying a mixture of yellow ochre, red iron oxide, and white to replicate the actual color of the clay on the Greek vessel. Then, atop the wet surface I applied a mixture of black … [Read more...] about Challenges

Greek Vases 101

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The black figure style of Greek vase painting was invented about 700 BCE and crossed over into the Golden 5th century BCE when the red figure style was adopted. The technique of the former method was to apply a liquid clay called slip over the terracotta colored surface of the vessel. This created black silhouettes atop the reddish color. This was … [Read more...] about Greek Vases 101

Nicosia Green Earth

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Left - Pure Nicosia Green Earth mixed with Linseed Middle - Holbein Silver White Right -  Exact beads of each color mixed together Nicosia Green Earth has many differing properties than Bohemian. This one has far lower saturation qualities. As you can see, mixing the same size bead together resulted in a much more pastel tone. This is a … [Read more...] about Nicosia Green Earth