Working Big (in acrylics)

I was recently at the Bath Contemporary Artists Fair (at Green Park Station) as a stall holder for the first time this year. Last year I had my rather large sausage (insert your own jokes here!) on display which drew the crowds in, but when it sold I didn't have anything as large that would attract attention. I promised that I would bring in something to equal the size and interest of the sausage.

So what to paint....? The last paintings I had created were for a commission (below), which gave me an idea.

Working on a big canvas is just as easy as working small (honestly!), but does require a little more planning.

I started by finding an old painting (from 2020) that I was happy to paint over. Yes, I know that sounds a little extreme, but believe me, if you live in a flat and have several metre sized painting kicking about you will consider repainting over older paintings rather than adding to them. In fact, you will probably find that, as you develop your skills, you will be happy to paint over some of your older works. You'll realise you can do better.

I painted the canvas blue; not because I really wanted it that colour, but more because I had a lot of blue paint ready to use. Working large will obviously use a lot more paint than working small, and covering the old painting was my aim. It is worth noting that many famous artists used to paint over old paintings, so it is not uncommon. It can also be a way of producing ready framed art, by picking up framed prints from charity shops, but do remember that you cannot paint over oil paints. Anything else is fine.

While waiting for the blue to dry, I started work on mocking up a quick image of my idea on my iPad using a couple of reference photos from the internet. The results were very satisfying.

Next stage was to get the layout of this image onto a metre high canvas. There were several ways I could have done this; either by projecting the image, using the grid method, or by tracing the image onto the canvas (which was the way I decided to go. Not easy though, as II had to cut the image up into four A3 sized images to be able to get them onto the canvas with the use of A3 carbon paper. I'm not going to go into specifics for how I managed that right here, but if you are interested, let me know and I'll do a little post on mocking up large images across several sheets of paper.

With the painting roughly copied, and the canvas up on my easel, I began (headphones on to stay focused) applying the underpainting in burnt umber. Most of you have tried underpainting before, but just to remind you, it is all about getting the shades onto the canvas, using undiluted paint, watered down paint and even some dry-brushing to produce a monochromatic image that looks rough, but holds all the right darks and lights.

Working this big means working standing up, and that is how I personally like to work; stepping back from the canvas to see how it looks from a sensible distance. If you are looking at getting your steps in for the day, this will do it!

At the end of my first session of painting I started adding a colour, fairly thin, to ensure that I didn't lose any of the underpainting. As soon as the colour started going on I could see the whole painting much clearer.

I used black paint as a background, as Vermeer did in 'The Girl with the Pearl Earring', and despite Gromit's nose looking black, I used very dark mix to create it. As I always maintain; black will kill all colour and won't look as good as a mix of other colours, and here I used violet, brown and a little of a ready-mixed Payne's grey.

Everyone has their own approach to adding colour, but personally I like to cover as much of the painting in as possible, fairly indiscriminately, to get an overall feel of the painting. It will take a good few hours to complete the painting with all the details, so I would rather get everything covered before I work on the finer points.

As the painting stands at the end of this two hour session you can still see a lot of colour that doesn't strictly belong - The blues and browns in the ruff for example, but I will try to keep some of these colours in when the painting is finished, as nothing is simply one colour. Adding a little complexity with splashes or letting the underpainting come through helps to give more depth to the colours, and can help to relate dark and light using blues or yellows, pinks and oranges.There is still a great deal of work to go, both in detail and in revisiting some of the things that do not quite work (his ears being a little dark, for example), so I am prepared to make lots of changes in the next few painting sessions.

This next phase of the painting process has been fairly straightforward. I think I only managed to catch about an hour of daylight so I used my time lightening up his ears, smoothing out his face and starting work on some of the details.

With the amount of detail in this painting, the size has worked to my advantage. It doesn't feel too fiddly to do, though I now have the difficult decision of when to stop.

There will always be improvements you feel you can make to a painting or drawing, no matter how detailed it becomes, so knowing when to stop is crucial. I have a way to go with this one, but I always bear in mind how other see it, and how much time they spend actually scrutinise it. The overall feel, and balance of light and dark are far more important than capturing every detail. If you are lucky enough to have someone you can ask about it - not a critique; more just letting you know if anything 'jarrs' and feels wrong, then I advise it. I often ask advice, though I often ignore it too, but it helps you decide if the choices you are making work for others rather than just yourself.

Here is 'His Royal Houndness' in all his glory; finally finished. The last few hours were tough, and there's always a debate to be had with yourself as to when it is finally finished (and I must admit I usually check to get another point of view, just to make sure nothing looks too out of place to anyone else).

At 100x70cm he's fairly big, but thankfully, being a deep framed canvas he looks great without a frame. I will be finishing him off with several coats of Liquitex satin varnish, and then he will be heading out to Green Park Station in Bath for his debut appearance at Bath Contemporary Artists Fair. There's no telling whether it will sell by Christmas, but I'm sure he will raise a few smiles, grab some attention, and he has a wall space here at home if he doesn't.

UPDATE - Oct 2025 - As you may realise, he did not sell over his several appearances at the market, as he now takes pride of place in Artful Studios for all the students to enjoy, and as an example of what can be painted when you 'go large'.