London Paintbox Studios

Friday is for Felines!

This big cat was painted by a young teenager!
It's a nocturnal scene, and that was the most challenging part... how much should we see of this mysterious feline?
The question has been answered by applying a few layers of dark galzing untin the desired outcome was reached.

The foregrounding scene is painted in a midtone that helps the high contrast of the sky and mountain profiles.

We love the galaxy that serves as a poetic backdrop of this image, painted using a toothbrush.

Well done!

As we approach our summer holidays, today we celebrate another marine animal, painted by a young student.

It is a close up oil painting of a sweet looking seal pup, with baby fat rolls sorrounding its smiling face. We love the subtle purples and blues hidden in the fur of the animal and the stippled brushstroke employed to give texture and a sense of softness.

Well done!

This oil painting by a young student is evocative of summers spent swimming in beautiful clean seas admiring the animals that inhabit the ocean.

We love how the light filters through the surface of the water hitting the carapace and fins with decisive cool nickel yellow touches.

The warm and cool blues of the water are wonderfully complemented by the browns on the body of the turtle, balancing the palette and turning the photographic reference image into a striking painting!

Well done!

This wonderful charcoal still life was completed by a young student.

We love the composition with its the round leit-motif carried by the apples and the glass sphere, travelling diagonally across the page, up and down the books.
Drawing from life is very challenging as we are required to really observe and flatten reality on the paper's surface. We think our student has done an excellent job with this drawing, especially with the sharp shadows that add drama to this classical composition.

A round of applause!

For this still life pencil drawing, two beautifully challenging objects have been picked from our shelf of curiosities: a shell and a dried artichoke.

The difficulty with drawing from life is to flatten onto the paper surface real objects without losing their tridimensional quality.

Therefore, to observe the subject matter is the first step: the leaves of the artichoke wrap around its center while the shell spirals around and out of its own core.

The details on the shell and on the dried spikey petals of the flower have been meticulously rendered, and so are the different textures on the two objects.

We love how delicately the pencil has been used to render the subtle tonal changes.

Well done to our student!

This excellent Hockney reproduction was completed during our summer course last week.

Our young artist has done a great job understanding the processes and use of materials.

From acrylic to oil, flat color fields, textures, and mark making no stone went unturned to begin discovering the wonderful world of painting.

Come join us at Paintbox Studios for a drawing taster class or for our summer courses!

This landscape oil painting was completed by a young artist on our Saturdays class.

It was decided to take inspiration from Peter Doig painting techniques and palettes to transform the photographic reference material into a painting.

We think our student has done an excellent job pushing the pallette into an almost surreal selection of pinks and oranges that give the sensation of being on a different planet.
The foregrounging gravel ground was built in delicate layers, utilising a toothbrush first to create a very thin texture to then build on top defined individual rocks.

Everything has been rendered with great attention to detail, from the chromatic whites on the snowy peaks to the shadows underneath the rocks in the foreground.

We love how the horizontal distribution of the yellows contrasts the dynamic, warm slopes of the mountains, framing them below a cold and heavy blue sky that perfectly cools down the composition.

All is left to say is...well done!

Poussin and Palladio go for a walk at Chiswick House... No, it isn't the beginning of a very well art-educated joke but what sparked the imagination of our student to bring to life this painting.

The image is made by the combination of the love for Neo-Palladian architecture, classical art, and what beautiful art and culture our neighborhood has to offer.

The figures are taken from Nicolas Poussin's Sheperds of Arcadia painting: the tomb has been omitted, and instead, the figures are caught in an enigmatic exchange.

The architecture in the background is a twist on the existing architecture of Chiswick House mixed with a classical temple. On the left, an acorn shaped plinth keeps us grounded in the beautiful west London gardens, an idyllic place as much as the one Poussin was trying to represent.

Our student has done an excellent job at combining multiple source materials and adapting them to one another. The light source, perspective, and pallette have been made to fit both images while keeping true resemblance with the work of the great masters the work was inspired by.

Well done!

This wonderful self-portrait, the first by our student, was recently completed during an adult class.

Inspired by Jenny Saville's pallette, we worked with three primary colors: cobalt blue, purple madder, lemon yellow hue plus, of course, a white.

The creamy gestural brushstrokes typical of Saville's work are here contrasted by the precise, nearly hyper-realistic rendition of the face.
The t-shirt is also made up of bald, instinctive brushstrokes connecting the language of the background to the figure.

Because of the very limited palette, similar colors appear in different parts of the painting, creating a cohesive image. Blues and purples have sneaked into the hair and skin tones, and we love how the acid yellow of the background has also become the highest point of light in the portrait.

A huge well done!



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