Steve Fleming

Artist Studio

Steve Fleming

In The Studio: 26 paintings out of 90, “Surfs Up”

The Artist In The Studio

15 x 22 arches rough.  In order to pull this off you need to make sure you have a good feeling for where you are going to leave the white for the surf and then when painting the sky leave a little more than you need.  Clean up the edges of the surf with a damp paper towel and then work on the rocks.  Make sure you have movement in the surf and that the pieces are of different sizes.  The color palette is blue, Cobalt and Ultramarine for the sky, Ultramarine Blue and Burnt Sienna for the rocks.  I threw a little raw sienna and new gamboge into the surf to get the feeling of seaweed and I used Titanium white for some of the spray.brush in the blue mixture on damp paper and clean up the edges of the surf with a damp paper towel.

brush in the rocks with a round brush and keep the edges textured and strongly stated, use nice rich dark values.  The amount of texture makes the rocks feel like there is water movement over top of them.  Remember they have to look like rocks so keep the hard and solid.

Brush in the water make sure that you attach the water and the rocks, merge some of the colors, but also leave some white. Scrape the tops of the rocks, these are big rocks so don’t get overly busy with the scrapping.  Make the scrapes varied and angular.

details of the inside of the surf and the white splatter.

2 Comments on “In The Studio: 26 paintings out of 90, “Surfs Up””

  1. wow, this is unlike anything I’ve ever seen you do in a demo. powerful, simple, much closer to the scene than you normally go. this exercise is pushing you into new and exciting places! it’s working!

  2. Rocks and water. Two issues very difficult to interpret. Thank you for teaching us. Your painting is wonderful

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.