Oh, the Places You Go!
Art Show & Sale by Susan Hamilton
Grant’s Frames hosts art shows with local artists regularly throughout the year. The year 2023 was our busiest year yet and included a tremendous art event benefiting St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
We are excited to start 2024 with a beautiful showing of oil paintings and pastels by Tulsa painter, Susan Hamilton. Walk into our showroom and enter a brilliant world of golden light and a kaleidoscope of color. Her work features landscapes, pathways, and animal subjects.
When asked about her process, Susan generously offered to give us a breakdown of her process which you will find below. We will have an artist’s reception Jan. 18th, 5-7 pm. The show and sale will run through Mar. 2.
Full Color Seeing and Four Stage Painting
This method is taught by Susan Sarback, the founder of The School of Light and Color in Fair Oaks, CA where I studied. A pallet knife is used to apply the paint onto the canvas. Although the school closed during the pandemic, Sarback has published a book detailing her process entitled, Capturing Radiant Light and Color, which is available on Amazon.
Stage 1 – Establishing the major masses and temperature.
The ‘under painting’ is essential in full color painting to set the temperatures and determine the light and shadows. This painting has three shadow areas and two sunlight areas. The shadows are done in cool colors (purple and blues) and the sunlit areas are expressed in warm colors.
Stage 2 – Refining the major masses
By adding the opposite color to an area, the temperature is tempered and slightly dulled. Yellow is added to the blue, creating green. Blue is overlayed onto the warm areas to create the sky and to dull the pavement. Adding orange to the blue along the road begins to designate the dirt hillside. Yellow on the pink in the distance softens the trees in sunlight.
Stage 3 – Developing three dimensions with color variations
In this stage, details and perspective begin to emerge as colors are alternated between warm and cool on the canvas. Some trees are positioned and the shadow on the road begins to take shape. The process of adding more colors to each area gives greater depth than simply using “local color”.
Stage 4 – More variations and edges
In this final stage, more details are added giving the cast shadows more variants along with the dappled light. The background trees are suggested without much detail, so they recede and blend into the atmosphere of their area. However, in the foreground, more definition is given to the trees including the overhanging branch. In the furthest distance, the trees in sunlight take on a warm rose color. With the curve of the road and the contrast of shadow and light, one is drawn towards the ‘top of the mountain’ to explore what might be around that corner.