Snowed In

Teacher Painting

"Paradise" 13x10.5" Oil on Canvas by Richard Robinson.

Teacher Painting

"Snowed In" 14x14" Oil on Canvas by Richard Robinson.

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Student Painting

"Snowed In V2" 9x12" Oil on canvas by Laura Xu

Hi Laura, good to see you tackled this painting as well as the one from the other angle. You're right that the painting doesn't really need the whole back of the truck there for a good composition. Your foreground is a little bitsy - could do with joining some of those dark shapes together to make larger masses. The soft shadow over the foreground is working really well though and it's great to see you've managed to get some of the warmth of the house and truck reflected into the snow there. Looks like you got a bit heavy handed in the background there with the arrangement of colours not clearly speaking of trees, nor are the thick branches. Just one patch of slightly lighter foliage would be enough to add a bit of life in there. The snow's shadowy transition to the background works really well. Not sure what that little patch of pink is doing in the snow under the house's main window. Would be better in the cooler snow colours. Overall pretty good! Just a few tweaks really.

Student Painting

"Snowed In V2" 30x30cm Oil on canvas by Marisa Comana Pessina

Hi Marisa, it's great to see you take your on perspective on this although unfortunately I don't think your bravery has paid off to any great degree. By making the fence posts, the truck and the house all pretty much the same size and lit the same way you've diluted the focus of the painting, taken the drama out of it. Now what's the painting about? The fencepost, the truck or the house? In my opinion one of these things should take centre stage. Looks like you've struggled with the trees behind the house which has left the house with a dark outline which is flattening out the house like a paper cutout, although all the texture in that area is quite beautiful. Good to see you using the palette knife as well as the brush.

Student Painting

"Workshop34" 8x10" Oil on canvas by Hyun(Jane) Kim

Beautiful work Hyun! Great colour, brushwork, drawing, interesting design - great to see. My one and only small reservation is that in a few areas like the house window and the tree trunks behind it where there is a call for some finer detail the brush you didn't switch to a smaller brush and the lines there seem a bit clumsy because of that. Oh also you could have softened the edges a little on the fence posts in the front left corner. Minor things. I think this is a great painting.

Student Painting

"Old Red" 11x16" Oil on canvas by Richard Spence

Hi Richard, good that you played with the scene in extending it to the right, but there's not a lot happening in those big white spaces. You could always glaze a big soft shadow across the foreground with a purple grey when this is dry. That would add some more interest. With no strong cast shadows in the painting you've turned this into an overcast scene, which has taken some of the drama out of it. You've got some nice detail in the truck cab and the house window. Just check the perspective drawing on both the truck and the house though. For instance you have the lines on horizontal lines on the truck face sloping up to the right which is good, but the lines on the side of the truck should slope up to the left, whereas you currently have them sloping down which is flattening out the truck. Same goes for the building. The greys in the background have become muddy which happens with overworking - blending warms and cools, lights and darks. Sometimes it's better to scrape off and start again when an area gets too muddy. Your path through the snow looks really good as do some of the lumps on the left. Keep it up!

Student Painting

"Your Season is Coming" 18.5 in x 15 in acrylic on canvas by Russell Kells

Nice work Russell. Great to see you make the image more your own and it surprised me how well you've done in positioning the tractor in terms of perspective and the direction of the light. The red colour works well against all those cool greys. The drawing of the tractor is very good although I'd take another look at the elipses in the front wheels. Your brushwork is nice and bold with enough detail where it counts. Good stuff.