Showing posts with label paintings. Show all posts

Hand-colour Photographs

From the beginning of the 20th century, right up through the 1950s or so, commercial hand colouring was relatively common. Today, there are a few photographers who keep the spirit alive.

Being exposed to photography and art since I was five has made me fall in love with all things creative... I've been using oil and acrylic paints, water color and pencils and yet found a number of ideas with this man that made me again truly inspired.

How can I not ask to post this? this man clearly has a great talent... Meet Bob Keefer. He allows me to post here how he does a hand-coloured photograph from start to finished.

This 8×10-inch black and white photo of summer leaves was shot on Tri-X and developed in Rodinal, a good combination for hand coloring, and printed on Luminos Charcoal paper, which, sadly, is no longer available. Here it’s taped to a work table to be colored.

I use regular artist acrylic paints and brushes for my work.

After quickly sealing the surface of the photo with clear matte acrylic medium and letting it dry, I begin by painting areas of transparent yellow acrylic on the leaves….

..Then I start mixing darker olive green into some of the other leaves.

At this point the image looks a little ragged.

I pick up a wash of ultramarine blue and clear medium on a brush; the color is an excellent one for darkening and deepening shadow areas.

At this point I’m just incrementally adding color, drying the paint, stepping back, taking a look, and adding some more.

Here I’ve just painted in some burnt sienna, a good warm reddish color, in some of the leafs. This really adds some subtle sparkle.

I sign my work on the front, in paint.

The final product.

About Bob Keefer

Bob has a degree in the study of religion from Harvard University. He’s been a newspaper writer for 30 years and now writes about art for The Register-Guard in Eugene, Oregon. In 2006 he was a fellow at National Endowment for the Arts workshop on theater and musical theatre. He crafts fine hand-colored photographs the old-fashioned way, using film. He uses a chemical darkroom, fiber-based paper and artist’s paints, without using Photoshop or any such new-fangled technology. No PhotoShop involved. Each resulting print is a unique work of art.

- taken from Photocritic.org

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Pablo Picasso

Two months until Christmas and -- yippee a reason to act like it has come early.

There is another important event on this day. In 1881 Pablo Picasso was born. Any art collector, indeed anyone with a brain, should know the name of the most prolific (according to the Guinness Book or Records) and innovative artist of the last century.

The Spanish painter and sculptor was born Pablo (Diego Jose'Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santisima Trinidad Ruiz y) Picasso! However, he produced even more works (100,000 prints); 13,500 paintings; 34,000 book illustrations; 300 sculptures) than he had names.

There is a story of a man once daring to criticize Picasso to his face for his 'unrealistic' art. Picasso reportedly asked him to show him some realistic art. The man pulled out a photograph of his wife. Picasso observed, 'So your wife is two inches tall, two-dimensional, with no arms and no legs, and no color but only shades of gray?' The man reply was no recorded. Walk round one of Picasso's sculptures or watch how his Cubist work jumps off the canvas, showing every angle of his subject.

(You can also see this in Camila Morton's A year in High Heels)

Some of Pablo Picasso's famous Paintings:

Self Portrait