Fall is here, my favorite time of year! This was the month I decided to try oil painting alla prima style on some smaller canvases. If you don't know what alla prima style is, essentially, it's starting and finishing a painting in one sitting, while the paint is still wet. I've gotta admit, I was scared to even try this painting style. I haven't even been playing with oil paint for long. I'd been thinking about alla prima for a while, telling myself "one day" I would give it a go. That one day was in October. I had a brave moment and thought to myself, "what the hell, just give it a go" and I did. Intentionally going out of your comfort zone helps you to learn and grow. The first three canvases painted were 11x14" gallery canvases that are 1.5" deep. The fourth was painted on a 9x12" canvas panel. Alkyd oil paint was used on these. Alkyd oils have a faster drying time. The last two canvases (alla prima #5 & #6) were painted using regular oil paint. These were both painted on 9x12 canvas panels. The regular oils I had and used were gifted to me and some were picked up secondhand many years ago. None of them were great quality oils, but it gave me a chance to try them. I did learn from this experience, but one thing stood out. That is that alkyd oil paint and regular oil paint are quite different. I found that alkyd paint is stickier than regular oils. You don't notice it at first with the alkyds because fresh out of the tube they are very blendable - but, over time, after the hours pass, they get a LOT stickier and trickier to blend. The regular oils, even though they were lesser quality, stayed open and and are easier to move and blend. I'm accustomed to painting while standing up but, since these were a smaller size, I put them on a small easel on a table and painted them there while sitting. Each painting took me between 4 and 5-1/2" hours to complete. Sitting there for so long was a pain in the neck - literally, which is something I hadn't experienced standing. It was interesting to experiment with alla prima and, I will practice this again in the future. After these first six paintings, I'm partial to #4 and #6.
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