2. Oils MIXED MEDIA
Combining several media can really enhance your paintings, as AINE DIVINE's new series explores. This month oils over acrylics adds character to a quick portrait session
50 Artists
& Illustrators
PHOTOS: JIM MACKINTOSH
T
his month I’m capturing another favourite subject in mixed media: the human head. I was lucky enough to have Aonghas MacNeacail, the wonderful poet and songwriter from the Isle of Skye, as my sitter. I love his shock of white hair, the bushy brows over earnest eyes, and his wonderful capacity for weaving a tale out of thin air – all wonderful attributes for an artist’s model. In this series, I want to give special mention to a particular medium and this month it’s the turn of oil paint. Oil paint has such weight and substance, from Rembrandt’s lacy collars to Lucian Freud’s fleshy nudes. There is a lush, buttery feel to it that is second to none. It sings out from the matt surface of dry acrylic paint and the combination really brings that extra substance and richness with it. I love to use oil paint with economy so that this richness is really seen. The oil layer for me often begins with a tone darker than anything in the acrylic layer. With that, I can then better locate the lights which typically use a lot more paint. The acrylic base often serves as the mid-tone. In the portrait of Aonghas over the page, you can see how the little dark of the nostril applied in oil paint explained the form and location of the nose, which was mostly painted in a subdued brownish mix. This dark cavity coupled with my brightest light on the tip of the nose explained the form of the nose. Aonghas and I have only had time for one session so far, so I’ve included two other finished portraits here to show the benefits of oil over acrylics. In the portrait of another bearded
