[Looking for critique] Sargent Study
1yr
Jason Arizona
Hello again, proko community!
I was lucky enough to get to go to a Sargent exhibit in my state(!!!)
But that's sort of a tangent. However, it did inspire me to do my first sargent study ever-- his portrait of Mrs. Charles E. Inches specifically.
I feel my understanding of values when it comes to color has been a bit lacking, (Of course, the value of studying it in black and white, which I'm confident in, rather than in actual color, when my problem is very chroma-focused, is debatable. But you can't really go wrong properly studying Sargent, am I right?)
I think the values are pretty spot on, but the proportions are WILDLY off. However, I think they're off in a somewhat appealing way.
If you have any advice, critique, or artists to study to help me "get" color, then that would be appreciated greatly! Thanks again for clicking on this post!
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1yr
Hey there, nice job! I absolutely love Sargent's work as well, and any chance to see it in person is always incredible! Don't miss out on his charcoal portrait sketches--quicker (relatively speaking) studies that I think help give insight on how he approached and structured his paintings in color.
As for approaching color, I would recommend trying out a limited palette first, a popular one being the Zorn palette --yellow ochre, ivory black, cadmium red light, and titanium white--(and Anders Zorn himself may also be an artist worth studying, especially if you like Sargent). Even if you are approaching this digitally, you can challenge yourself to a limited palette by placing the colors on the canvas and having to color pick from that color wheel rather than the unlimited color wheel in your drawing program.
As for resources, Color & Light by James Gurney is the artist's bible to color, and Marco Bucci has a ton of great tutorials on it both on Youtube and here on Proko as well, like this one: https://www.proko.com/s/e2uj
But continuing to do studies both from masters, photographs, and real life is the most important. When focusing on color, quick mini paintings that get the main idea for color, with little focus on detail, help get the mileage you need best through repetition and trial and error (I recommend taking a look at plein air painters and groups like Warrior Painters). While learning color theory/science through the resources above, developing an intuitive feeling for it via hands-on practice is key.
Hope this helps! :)
You could digitally "glaze" some color over this black and white painting to see if you can learn how color would look with these values.
I added a layer, made it a color blending mode, and glazed colors over it to show you what I mean, I hope it helps :)
That looks pretty nice indeed! Usually, if i go from B&W to color, I literally paint over the black and white sketch with the color.
okay i screwed up and posted the same picture twice because i thought i had already attached it whoops
