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.

Margret's Blog

Peek Performance

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Posted here is a detail of painting number 9. The source catalog painting by Rembrandt is a very limited palette and includes many of the friendly colors described in Intimidations below. In spite of the limited range of hues used by Rembrandt, vermilion reds were prominent. I have attempted to capitalize on the chiaroscuro technique here by … [Read more...] about Peek Performance

Intimidations

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Time has come finally to tackle one of the Rembrandt’s from the Rembrandt and the Golden Age of Dutch Art exhibit as a source painting. This is a very intimidating quest indeed. My approach was not to think about the genius of Rembrandt, but to concentrate on his colors and probable pigments used. By thinking of it in this manner, the task was not … [Read more...] about Intimidations

Very Vermilion

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Back in October of 2006 while viewing the Rembrandt exhibit at the Dayton Art Institute, I knew in an instant this one must be used as a source painting for one in my Lessons from the Low Countries series. The anticipation of using this masterpiece was heightened because of the brilliant and varied pigment possibilities. After seeing this small … [Read more...] about Very Vermilion

Southwest Sienna

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Several years ago while traveling in the Southwest, we visited  Utah's famous Bryce and Zion National Parks. As many of you probably know, the hills there are spectacular colors, glowing with reds and golds in endless varieties. Because I did not want any trouble from those pesky park rangers, I waited until we were outside of the boundaries of the … [Read more...] about Southwest Sienna

Viridian vs. Verona

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Often in this blog documentation, I have talked about color saturation. This is very important to anyone using color in any way, no matter the medium. The saturation of a color, paint, or dye, is the intensity of the pigment, meaning how weak or powerful it is. Often, I have mentioned a color having a weak tinting strength, especially the earth … [Read more...] about Viridian vs. Verona