Artists's Guide on Painting Luscious Greens

Demonstration for Landscape Painters on How to Mix Realistic Greens

© Rachel Wills

Jun 23, 2009

Mixing greens is often a problem for the landscape artist. This is because greens are usually everywhere. Without careful thought, capturing a scene that contains many greens, as the English countryside often does, could easily end up looking like little more than a big block of flat viridian.

A Rustic Barn in the Lake District

Few places are greener than the northwest of England where this scene of the rustic barn is situated. In this demonstration, there is a strong sense of background and foreground and also of light and shade. Such a scene would be ideal for exploring how distance affects greens and also its associated tones.

Materials Required for Oil Painting the Countryside

1. A suitable landscape photograph depicting many greens
2. Acrylic paint in permanent rose
3. Oil paints in the following colours: titanium, viridian, lemon yellow, cadmium yellow, pthalo blue, ultramarine, permanent rose, burnt sienna and burnt umber
4. A 254mmx 305mm (10” x 12”) sized painting surface. In the case of this demonstration, canvas-board had been used; the textures of the surface offered interesting effects upon the paint applied. Alternatively, Daler Rowney’s Dalerboard. A piece of MDF or hardboard is fine, so long as it has been primed.
5. A size 3 and size 6 round sable brushes
6. A 0.5 inch wide bristle brush
7. A palette consisting of a china plate or varnished wood.
8. Small pot of artists’ white spirits
9. A few rags

Painting a Rustic Barn and Dry-stone Walls

Firstly, a thin glaze of acrylic paint had been applied onto the painting surface. This is known as an imprimitura and is intended to kill the off-putting white of the painting surface. In this case, permanent rose had been used.

Once the paint had dried , the outline of the image was carefully drawn out onto the surface by using a soft pencil. Care was taken in ensuring accuracy of the lines.

The barn and the dry-stone wall form part of the foreground and will therefore stand out against the soft greens of the background. The brickwork was simplified into three main colours: pale, mid and dark. By loading the sable brush with plenty of titanium, the colour was dabbed onto the sunlit areas of the dry-stone walls first.

With progressively more burnt umber and a little ultramarine, the darker colours were dabbed onto the more shaded areas of the barn (fig 1).

Finally, for the darkest tone, yet more of these dark colours were mixed and dabbed onto the crevasses of the barn nad the drystone wall (fig 2).

Making Greens Look Distant With Recession

This scene contains sunlight and shade, giving many opportunities for interesting greens. The pale greens were achieved by mixing lemon yellow with a little viridian and lots of titanium. This was daubed onto the mossy roof of the barn. In order to give the illusion of distance, a little more titanium and blue was introduced to the green mixture and added to the sunlit areas of the mountains in the background (fig 3)

How to Darken Greens for Landscape Painting

In order to avoid dirty mixes, never darken a colour by using black. It is best to use the colour’s complimentary. In the case of green, this will be in the red spectrum, anything from pink to violet. For this painting, a dark violet produced by the mixture of ultramarine and permanent rose. This would give the shadowed areas some warmth (fig 4). Don’t be tempted to smooth out the colours, let the brush marks remain.

With a soft clean brush, the areas between the colours were knitted together. Leaving some of the pinkish imprimitura exposed between the colours adds texture and vibrancy to the greens, and breaks up the painting in interesting ways.

Tips on Mixing Greens

Interesting greens can be produced quite easily with a few guidelines.

• Never use black to darken green
• Add a little violet and white to green to give the impression of distance or misty weather
• Use green’s complimentary to express shadows, such as pinks, reds or violets.
• The most unexpected colours can be found in greens, such as browns and purples
• Using a thin glaze in the complimentary colour to the green will break up the green areas and add texture to the painting
• Don't be tempted to smooth out the greens. Allow the brush marks to remain to give the painting some expression.

The Barn in the Lake District

Oil Painting the Drystone Walls (fig 1)

Suggesting Shadows in the Brick Work (fig 2)

Mixing Sunlit Greens in Oil Colour (fig 3)

Painting Shaded Greens on the Trees (fig 4)

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