Oil Paint
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Inspiration
Edgar Degas is often identified as an Impressionist who painted the realities of the world around them using bright, "dazzling" colors, concentrating primarily on the effects of light, and hoping to infuse their scenes with immediacy. He expressed visual experience in that exact moment. Blue Dancers, sometimes referred to as Dancers in Blue, arrived in 1890 is maybe one of the most famous Edgar Degas ballet dancer paintings. Edgar Degas, moves his focus away from nude women bathing, towards a more innocent approach by portraying young ballerinas. Degas is primarily known for his work in painting ballerinas being able to create a wide array of paintings in different styles of ballet to keep his audience interested. The Blue Dancers are one of the only paintings by Degas where the artist opted for cool tones in order to depict the women. I was inspired by this painting because of the cool colors and I knew I could do something with it and relate it back to dance. |
Planning
I started by planning out how I could represent my injury and keep the painting similar to Edgar Degas Blue Dancer. I came up with the idea of having my in by dance dress and boot and in pose like a dancer. I thought this would be best because my dance dress is blue and I could compare the different blues like how Edgar Degas did. I wanted to make the boot the key part because that is what is blocking me from dancing and I wanted it to be a clear idea in the painting. I thought it would be best if I painted the back of my dress because I could show if the boot better and that was where the focus would be going instead of my face. I took the pictures in front of a burnt orange curtain because I thought it would look the best with the blue colors. After finding the correct pose I finally decided it was time to start painting.
I started by planning out how I could represent my injury and keep the painting similar to Edgar Degas Blue Dancer. I came up with the idea of having my in by dance dress and boot and in pose like a dancer. I thought this would be best because my dance dress is blue and I could compare the different blues like how Edgar Degas did. I wanted to make the boot the key part because that is what is blocking me from dancing and I wanted it to be a clear idea in the painting. I thought it would be best if I painted the back of my dress because I could show if the boot better and that was where the focus would be going instead of my face. I took the pictures in front of a burnt orange curtain because I thought it would look the best with the blue colors. After finding the correct pose I finally decided it was time to start painting.
Process
I started by adding a light yellow wash to my 2x3 foot canvas. I then added one inch grids to my canvas so when I sketched I could line everything up perfectly. I started to sketch out me on the canvas to make sure everything was how I wanted it to look. I then started with the burnt orange color at the top so I would not have to drag my arm through the final painted piece to finish that. I started with the outline of my hair to get a base coat so that when I added the details of my blonde hair there would be layers. I then started to add all the little details of the bling and different details of the dress. |
I added more details with sketching to make sure everything would be in the correct place. I then went in with balck paint and painted everything that was supposed to be black on my dress. This was a challenge because I spaced out all the different crystals and I had to go in a add black paint in between. If didn’t want to paint over the crystals but I also wanted it to be covered enough where you could not see the canvas. I also needed to make sure to keep the shape of everything when painting because if I messed up one line the whole painting could be off.
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I then added in more details with the black. This got easy because towards the bottom of the dress there was more black rather than the crystals. I also added a base coat of the blue to the sleeves of the dress. This was easy because it was just painting in the lines. I just needed to make sure I did not go over the lines because otherwise it would look like the dress is messed up. I also worked on the legs at this point. I created a pale skin tone color and painted the front leg, once that was done I added a little brown to darken it for the shadow of the back leg. I also went in and added the shadow for the front leg where the dress casted.
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