New York Academy of Art

What is oil paint, anyway? What is a “odorless mineral spirit”? How do I clean my brushes? And how come all those Old Master paintings look like they glow?! This course will focus on the fundamentals of oil painting through indirect painting, the systematic layering of paint to optically mix color and create depth. On day one, we’ll cover all those scary, beginner questions and get a feel for working with oil by creating quick, tonal studies with one pigment. For the first three weeks, we’ll be working with Casts to practice wipe out imprimatura, open & closed grisaille, structure, anatomy, proportion, and value using only titanium white, ivory black, and raw umber. In the final half of the class, we’ll really begin to dive into direct painting by applying chromatic glazes to our casts. We’ll keep it simple with a warm/cool palette of your choosing, so we can explore glazing/velatura, temperature, and color mixing.