Image courtesy Sage

Portrait Painting in Oils with Artist Sage

Tuesday 1 August 2023

Bethlem Gallery
1pm – 4pm

Join experienced portrait artist Sage for a workshop on painting with oils. 

Starting from a graphite underdrawing, we will move into water-miscible oil paints to explore the effect of light and how to express this using a limited palette. We will focus on the “values” we see in a face, “temperatures” and “hues”, meaning the full three aspects of colour: value (ie how light or dark it appears), chroma (or saturation), and hue (the red, yellow or blueness). 

We will focus on drawing and painting a one-third life-size image, to improve the overall impression of how to paint ourselves (or another person). We will use technology to simplify our photo reference, improving our understanding of light and form. 
The aim of the workshop is to paint using the “alla prima” technique, so participants finish a painting in one sitting (or at least get a good structure to continue at home). There will be tips from Sage throughout to better understand how to approach a portrait in oils. Sage’s portrait method will aid us in approaching how we identify colours and then mix paint to correspond: namely, “How dark or light is it? What hue is it? How saturated is it?”. 

All welcome and all materials are included. Ideally, please bring along your mobile phone or ipad, or a good-quality reference photo. Alternatively, you may choose to paint directly from life, using a mirror. 

About Bethlem Gallery workshops

Under 16’s must be accompanied by an adult. Concessions are available for SLaM service users, people over 60, students, people receiving ESA, people registered disabled and their carers.

If you are unable to attend the workshop, please contact us to cancel your place. We often have a waiting list and concessions places are extremely popular.

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