Phthaloranosaurus Rex, or How to paint with Phthalo Green

9" x 12" Oil on Panel

Well meaning people can sometimes cause problems.

A friend of mine owned some oil paints from a while ago when he had an interest in painting. Apparently, the muse wandered away from him years ago, and he no longer had interest in, nor use for the paints. He knows I oil paint, so he just dropped those waif-like paints off at my place. Now, there were among those paints some colors I use, like white, black, yellow ochre, and a couple cadmiums. There were a few colors I don't normally use, but can find a place for, such as thio violet. There were a few I don't know what to do with (Dioxazine purple - what the heck?) But red flags went up when I saw those two trouble-making colors, phthalo green and phthalo blue.

I've tried phthalocyanine (phthalo) paints before, years ago. They're inexpensive, lightfast, and strong colors. But "strong" might not be the right word for them. More like obnoxious, overbearing, overpowering, even totalitarian. They can overrun and conquer your entire painting, giving an acidic blue-green cast to the entire work. I've spent a lot of time knocking back the strength of phthalos to get them to the earth tones typical of landscapes instead of the overly assertive colors phthalos want to be. After trying phthalo green and phthalo blue once, I've replaced them with viridian green and cobalt blue.

But now, here they were again. Phthalos. Try saying that out loud without spitting all over your computer screen. I didn't want them. I wanted to throw them away. I thought about taking the caps off the paint tubes and tossing them out the car window as I sped down a busy highway. Then later I might go back to see what color the highway had become. But no, I decided to give those two annoyingly brilliant colors one more try.

A palette which includes phthalos needs strong checks and balances, and I already had a good counter color - cadmium red. Not only is red the complementary color to green, but cadmium red is a dirty mixer, and can even be useful in toning down phthalo blue. In the painting shown at the top of this post, the sky was painted with phthalo blue and titanium white, toned down with cadmium red, ultramarine blue, and maybe touches of a few other colors. The trees in the painting were done using phthalo green, with cadmium red - a lot of it - and cadmium yellow to tone down and warm up the greens. A mix of thio violet* and ultramarine blue, with a little yellow, were added to phthalo green for the darkest parts of the trees. Again, small amounts of other colors made their way into the painting's trees, but I don't remember all the details.

I was happy with how phthalo green and phthalo blue worked in this painting. A few more examples of paintings I've made using phthalo colors can be seen in this post and this post. I think I'll keep those two tubes of paint and use them. At least until they're done - then I'll happily go back to viridian and cobalt!

As I drove away from my painting spot, I saw in another direction a huge plume of smoke from a wildfire in the mountains. It kind of reminded me of what can happen to a painting if you don't keep your phthalocyanine under control!

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*Instead of alizarin crimson or quinacridone red.

Brunette

10" x 8" Oil on Panel

A short post, and another two and a half hour or so oil sketch from one of last weeks portrait sessions. A fun model to paint. Colors used for this portrait were the usual: cadmium yellow, cadmium red, ivory black, and titanium white.

For more about portrait sessions, go to "Labels" on the side bar and click on "portrait", "sketching" or "drawing".

Down in the Valley and up by a Mountain Lake

9" x 12" Oil on Panel

A couple more paintings made in the last little while share this post. The first one was painted west of town, near the lake. My interest was in the distant ridges, and in the clouds passing overhead. Some things in a landscape, like shadows and clouds, move. Moving things are a little more challenging to paint from life. Clouds move even faster than cast shadows, so they get painted first. Whether painting cast shadows or clouds, a quick lay-in starts the process off, then memory is used to finish it. 

9" x 12" Oil on Panel

The second was painted at an alpine lake, nearly 10,000 feet elevation in the Wasatch Mountains. The lake is in the Albion Basin, and is a popular destination for hikers of all ages. Social media and ease of access have made it perhaps a little too popular. The trail is only about two miles from parking area to lake. On this particular day there were so many people winding their way up the trail to the lake that I felt like I was joining a pilgrimage rather than going on a nature hike. The lake and surrounding mountains are nonetheless beautiful. I set up on a rocky point that juts out into the water. From there I painted a group of trees near the shore and across part of the lake.

While painting, I noticed that there were several salamanders swimming around in the lake near me. They are young tiger salamanders, about five or six inches long. A new discovery for me! I haven't seen salamanders in Utah until now.

There were also lots of brightly clad tourists around the lake. Here I was out in "wilderness," and never before have I had so many people standing around me watching me paint! I was glad the rocky point I was on was was relatively narrow, which allowed only so many spectators at a time.

Salamanders can swim in the lake, but according to a sign at the top of the trail, people aren't allowed to. Yet, the cold water of the lake is irresistible to some, and a few people jumped in and began swimming. Several, especially children, waded near shore. Before long, a man (I presume he was a ranger) stood high on a rock on the other side of the lake and yelled at the swimmers to get out of the water. "Can't you read the sign? No swimming!" A uniformed ranger then walked around the lake brusquely telling anyone who had so much as their toes in the water to get out of the water.

The weather that day was wonderful. It wasn't until late in the day that clouds moved in, blocking the sun. Shortly after finishing the painting, I began the hike back down the trail. Peak season for alpine flowers is past, but the meadows the trail wound through were still richly speckled with color. Lupine, paintbrush, aster, and other wildflowers of all colors brightened the meadows along the way. A deer browsed near meadow's edge by a stand of evergreen trees.

Mutton Chops

7" x 5" Oil on Canvas Panel

Our model for the portrait session last Thursday was fun to paint. I arrived a little late so I had to set up way over on the side, as all the spots in front of the model were already taken. Because of that, I only got to paint one mutton chop, not both. That would have been twice as much fun!

This little painting was made, as usual, with just three colors, plus titanium white. Cadmium yellow and cadmium red were used, but instead of ivory black I used a Holbein color called "blue black."

For more about portrait sessions, go to "Labels" on the side bar and click on "portrait", "sketching" or "drawing".