Current Work

Hey guys!

Today I want to show you a detail image of a project study. (I hope that I can show you the finished work soon. )

I found out that it makes lot of fun to paint on dark carton panels. It’s an easy and fast way to make good looking sketches. Only a few brush strokes can give you an idea how the final work could look like. But it makes only sense when there are a lot of darker tones in the painting. Otherwise I prefer skin tone groundings.

The image below shows just a bit of the of the unfinished sketch. (The size of the image detail is about 6x9cm.) If you have any question, please feel free to ask!

Figure painting exercise – Acrylic on wooden plate 15×24 cm

It has been a long time since I have painted my last portrait. It was about time to try it again. The fact that I am on vacation helped me a lot: I have nothing but some acrylics with me and there is nothing else to do due to the bad weather.

This morning I tried to paint a non-photorealistic portrait. I used an old wooden panel which has quite an abrasive surface and some dirt spots on it. The unclean surface forced me to paint more inaccurate and this is exactly what I wanted. Finally I am happy with the result(, despite the reduced colour palette). And I didn’t make any big mistakes. 😉

Feel free to visit my website: www.rafaelkoller.ch

Figure painting – Acrylic on wooden panel 15x24cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portrait Study – Acrylic on Carton (ca. 30×40 cm)

Just another portrait painting exercise with a reduced colour palette .
The workflow animation below shows how I approached the final painting.

Portrait Study - Acrylic on Carton ca. 30x40cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Workflow: Portrait Study - Acrylic on Carton ca. 30x40cm(© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portrait Study – Acrylic on Carton (ca. 30×40 cm)

Today I had some free time… 🙂

Portrait Study - Acrylic on Carton 30x40cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Workflow: Portrait Study - Acrylic on Carton 30x40cm(© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portrait 2 – Painting Sketchbook

Well, this is another rough painting sketch i did a while ago. (ca A4)

Painting Sketchbook - Acrylic Study 2 (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portrait – Oil on Carton 40x50cm (with workflow animation)

Normally I need a lot of time to finish a painting. In this case a new workflow strategy allowed me to finish it within a quite short time. At first I made a precise tracing. In a second step I used acrylic to make a rough underpainting. Finally it was easy to finish it off with oils.

The main advantage of an acrylic underpainting is its fast drying. It allows painting several transparent layers immediately.

Portrait - Oil on Carton 40 x 50 cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Workflow-animation: Portrait - Oil on Carton 40 x 50 cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portrait – Painting Sketchbook

A page from my painting sketchbook I use for exercises purposes only – a fast acrylic study.

Painting Sketchbook - Acrylic Study (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Acrylic on carton, 40 x 60 cm

I finished this painting a year ago. Acrylic is a quite good medium to paint with, nevertheless I had some problems painting gradients. In my opinion acrylics are suited for underpaintigs, because it dries instantly in contrast to oil. As the acrylic underpainting is done one can change to oils. This way to paint allows a fast and precise workflow.

Portait: Acrylic on Carton, 40x60 cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)

Portait (Detail) : Acrylic on Carton, 40x60 cm (© Rafael Koller. All rights reserved)