Solar Eclipse (on Canvas)

Hello again! Finally finding some time to write about my past artwork. Today sharing with you a painting I made back in late-April. Remember that solar eclipse earlier that week? Although my friends in the U.S. were able to enjoy the view then, the eclipse was unfortunately not visible here in the Netherlands. Nevertheless, I was fascinated by the visual effects of it and decided to paint about it. First on black paper and chalk/pastel as described in Solar Eclipse (on Paper)

From Paper to Canvas

The original artwork I was inspired by featured an anime character standing in front of the eclipse and from there, I made my own variation in which Little One was featured instead! And seeing how I liked liked how it turned out, why not on canvas with acrylic paint this time? Actually I went for canvas board as I find they save space. A layer of black gesso by Amsterdam Acrylic was applied with a wide stiff brush. Then once dry, I set about sketching with a white chalk pencil.

Painting Away

Once I was happy with the sketch I began tracing the lines with white Uni Posts marker then spreading some modeling paste on the hair for texture. So far so cute!

And once the paste was dry, a combination of ARA’s Metallic Black and Metallic White was used to color in the greys and black. I then mixed some Primary Cyan Blue (Amsterdam Acrylic) and the Metallic White for the blue eyes and part of the areas reflecting that color.

Adding More Texture

Another reason for the acrylic-on-canvas version of this painting is that I wanted to experiment with texture. Having the solar eclipse as theme gives a lot of possibilities to play around with especially with the sparkles and glitter. And hence I went for IZINK Diamond glitter paint and special glitter liner by Art by Marlene around the sun. Also spread a bit around the hair. Finally, to enhance the white in the eyes, I went for Opaque Titanium White by ARA. Er voilà!

What fun that was! Wish I were able to write about it here earlier but then better late than never, right? The paper and chalk version was certainly a great start in terms of playing around with a pitch-black background. However introducing texture really lets the whole image pop out more especially with sparkles and the streaks in the hair. Very pleased with it, especially seeing how Little One looks so adorable too! And now, let’s wait for the digital painting version of this…