This painting is part of a series I am currently working on. It was based on photographs I took of wooden barricades in Canyonlands National Park in Utah. I decided to use only black and white acrylic paint because I felt color might weaken the dramatic effect of the wood’s nuanced surfaces.
15 Winning Acrylic Still Life Paintings
✓ Showcase your talent and win big in Artists Network prestigious art competitions! Discover competitions in a variety of media and enter for your chance to win cash prizes, publication in leading art magazines, global exposure, and rewards for your hard work. Plus, gain valuable feedback from renowned jurors. Let your passion shine through – enter an art competition today!
The Value in Still Life Artwork
Value is an essential tool on the hands of artists. It creates interest, mood, contrast and helps artists express what they want to say about their subject. Value provides an underlying structure to art — especially for those who paint still life artwork.
Here is a look at 15 of the best contemporary still life artwork, featured in AcrylicWorks 5 — which is all about bold value. Let these award-winning acrylic paintings inspire you to explore value more in your own art. Enjoy!
Flying High
Boldness as a theme seemed intrinsic to painting aircraft and was what attracted me to this subject, not only in the values, but also in the highly specular, reflective surfaces. In the case of the Pan Am Cloud Clipper, its polished aluminum skin, while monochrome itself, reflects every color in its environment. I accentuated the bold, sweeping lines of the plane by choosing a tight composition to the left of the fuselage, which gives the illusion of the plane passing just over the viewer.
The plane is displayed in the National Air and Space Museum’s Boeing Aviation Hanger at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia. I worked from photographs in my studio, using the neutral background to emphasize the color and composition best.
Paint-along still life apple.
If you missed Parts 1 and 2 of my Absolute Beginners painting series, you can check them out here and here.
So, you’ve chosen to paint with acrylics! Excellent choice! Or maybe you’re just reading this post for the heck of it – also excellent! Thank you so much. If you’ve never painted with acrylics before, please, let me be your guide.
Today we are going to paint this (if you want to):
First up, let me explain the basic of acrylic paints in this video below:
Basic acrylic painting shopping list
Yay, you get to go shopping! Here’s what you’ll need to get started with acrylics:
- Acrylic paint, 60 ml tubes (I recommend TriArt or Golden paints): Alizarin crimson, cadmium red medium, cadmium yellow medium, ultramarine blue, burnt umber, raw umber, burnt sienna, raw sienna, chrome oxide green (optional), Payne’s grey, titanium white
- Brushes: Round #6, flat 1/2″ thick, filbert #2 or #4 – short handle if you’ll be working at a table, long handle if working at an easel (I prefer synthetic soft bristles, other option is hog hair, see what you like) – inexpensive is ok, but I don’t recommend dollar store paintbrushes – you would regret it
- Pre-stretched canvases – you can buy a bulk pack for a volume discount (12 x 12″ is a good size to go with) and/or pad of inexpensive canvas sheets for practice
- Retarder (optional) – Golden makes a good one
- Palette: Disposable palette sheets (optional, looks like a pad of paper) – or a piece of plywood or Masonite board – it is up to you
Paint-Along: Still Life With Apple
Here’s what you’ll need for our paint-along:
- Titanium white
- Cadmium yellow medium
- Naphthol red medium (or cadmium red medium from basic palette0
- Alizarin crimson
- Payne’s grey
- Chrome oxide green (optional)
Click below to watch me paint. You can paint along with me! I recommend you get all your supplies assembled, a nice cozy tea, and then press play! You can follow me, skip around to the parts you need. You’ll have your first painted masterpiece in no time. I’m no Bob Ross but I really try to break it down for viewers. And I apologize for the length! This is my first kind of “paint-with-me” video and there’s definitely a learning curve. But I thought, ah, I’ve got to start somewhere so here we are.
I hope you all enjoyed this little how-to and tutorial. The best way to learn how to paint, is to paint – as much as possible. If you painted along, please please please share your work in the comments below! Any comments? Questions? I love to hear from you!
Thank you everyone for reading and watching!
