New Online Class

 Figurative encaustic paintings

I filmed an informal session in my studio of me painting a portrait in encaustic. It is as if you were standing right new to me in my studio watching me work.
https://vimeo.com/251237255

I found that it is a challenge for me to talk while I work. but it is easier to see my palette layout and the use of brushes and tools to create a portrait.

Here is the first comment on the class: "Excellent. I have the book "A step by step guide to creating portraits in encaustic" by her but this video is way more enlightening. Seeing how she works from straight oil paints with only encaustic medium as a carrier is very informative. Watching her work back and forth through the composition is incredibly helpful. Because it gets to the same stage every painting gets where it looks like a mess. But then you see her work through the same steps in increasing detail until it's done. She uses almost no tools - 3 brushes and a pottery carving tool. And the only colored encaustic she uses is black (and that probably wasn't required because she could have used china marker or black oil pastel stick). It does take oil paints to follow this, just a couple reds, a couple yellows, a couple blues, white and an ochre (if you want to do it the same. but the same results could have been achieved probably with a limited palette of red, yellow, blue, white and burnt sienna) At the end where she rubs in oil pastel was very useful is seeing how to get very smooth skin textures if you want. Well worth the money, more useful than the book and faster delivery than the book."

Here  is the intro video:https://vimeo.com/251554130