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Oil painting of our family cat sitting in a basket. #art #artist #painting #cat #ragamuffin

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Ragamuffin Cat in a Basket, Giclee Art Print

“Ragamuffin Cat in a Basket” – Original oil painting by Jon Amdall using alla prima direct painting technique, Utrecht brushes, Gamblin and Utrecht paints, and Strathmore paper. Art prints are from FinerWorks via Etsy, high resolution (720 DPI, 48 bit color) prints on Premium Giclee thick (21-mil) heavy weight (310g) paper. Process time-lapse and discussion videos for this piece:

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Pirate Skeleton Portrait, Giclee Art Print

“Pirate Skeleton Portrait” – Original oil painting by Jon Amdall using alla prima direct painting technique, Utrecht brushes, Gamblin and Utrecht paints, and Strathmore paper. Art prints are from FinerWorks via Etsy, high resolution (720 DPI, 48 bit color) prints on Premium Giclee thick (21-mil) heavy weight (310g) paper. Process time-lapse and discussion videos for this piece:

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Woman Sitting Overlooking a Seascape, Giclee Art

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Practicing Specific Weaknesses |Portrait Oil Painting

One big emphasis lately has been natural sitting poses.My hope is to keep working at depicting subjects in normal relaxed poses until those solid efforts mostly overtake the rough. #art #painting #portrait #artist

I tend to practice and repeat specific themes when it comes to portrait painting. This seems to manifest itself most often with concepts or features that I view as weaker areas. Earlier in my painting journey, probably for the first 150 or so oil paintings, I honestly really needed to practice everything. So, I didn’t narrow in as much on specific concepts or weaknesses, because arguably…

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Portrait Oil Painting | Step by Step Walkthrough

This post features a step by step walkthrough of my portrait oil painting approach. I wanted to create something a bit more detailed than the usual time lapse. #art #painting #tutorial #walkthrough #artist #oilpainting

This post features a step by step walkthrough of my portrait oil painting approach. Although I’ve shared a few walkthrough videos on YouTube of my process, I wanted to create something that was a bit more sequential and organized, as well as a bit longer, to really capture how I approach these alla prima portrait oil paintings. It just so happened that this recent study of a woman holding a book…

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Cotton vs Linen Paper for Oil Painting

Although I almost always use rigid textured linen paper by Strathmore for my oil painting, I have tried a softer cotton paper as well. This portrait is on that softer surface #art #portrat #painting #paper

The vast majority of my oil paintings are done on Strathmore 400 series oil paper, which is a treated linen that feels somewhat rigid like canvass. I am very much a creature of habit, so part of it is that I’m used to how it feels and how paint acts on it. But it’s also pretty cost effective, and storage is much easier than canvass. With the painting that is the subject of this post though, I…

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Dark and Near Black Color Blends in Oil Painting

With this portrait, I had an itch to get some practice with dark oil painting color blends, partially inspired by wanting to improve on one that featured tons of darkness with small bright highlights. #art #painting #portrait #artist #allaprima

I had an itch to get some practice with dark oil painting color blends, partially inspired by wanting to improve on a prior portrait painting that featured tons of darkness with small bright highlights. I thought I’d take a shot at similar concepts again, really pushing myself to practice some blends. With this piece, I used a few different mixes of varying proportions: Raw umber, ultramarine…

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Postcard Art Exhibit Oil Painting for the 2024 Texas Show

One of the painting highlights of 2024 for me was getting to participate in the Postcard Art Exhibit (PAE). It's a charity event that was close to where I live, this is the piece I submitted. #art #painting #artshow #exhibit

One of the painting highlights of 2024 for me was getting to participate in the Postcard Art Exhibit (PAE). It’s a charity event that is hosted in different locations, and the one last year was fairly close to me in McKinney, Texas benefiting the Millhouse Foundation. I don’t have much experience with art shows, but this was a ton of fun and I’m really glad I got to do it. Basically, an artist…

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Starting Paintings with Background Wash or Base Layer

Lately I've been experiencing an internal struggle on whether to continue painting directly into empty space or starting with a base layer or background wash. This portrait started me down a new path on this. #art #artist #portrait

I’m currently experiencing an internal struggle with the start of my process. Most artists I follow start their oil paintings with a background wash or base layer of color, which helps eliminate the bright white from their canvass or paper and potentially makes blending easier. But, for most of my 240ish oil paintings, I have started my loose outline without this background wash. I have had a few…

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Figure Poses and Light on Fabric in Oil Portraits

Like many portrait artists in the learning process, I have an admiration for John Singer Sargent, particularly the way he painted natural figure poses and subtle details of light and fabric - more on in the post. #portraitart #oilpainting #sargent #artist

Sometimes I just paint without any specific reason or goal, but with this piece I actually had a couple specific things I wanted to practice. I was talking with some colleagues about my appreciation for John Singer Sargent’s paintings, particularly Lady Agnew of Locknaw. I love the way Sargent captured the nature of light on fabric, and a nature instinct is to see if it’s something I could…

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Expressive Eyes and Subtlety in Portrait Painting

This post is a throw back to a figure study I did almost exactly a year ago. I've long been interested in expressive eyes in portrait painting, and this is one that I think worked well. #portrait #oilpainting #artist #art #paint

Almost from the start of my quest to learn to paint with oils, I’ve been captivated by expressive eyes in portraits. It’s something I’m drawn to just when I’m admiring paintings by other artists, so I naturally gravitated to wanting to learn how to emulate the same effect. Unfortunately for me perhaps, I learned quickly that it requires a subtle touch and more experience than I had in the first…

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Oil Painting of Sunlight Through a Window

I think some of my best paintings come from a loose approach and relaxed mindset. I really wanted to explore some bright and interesting color mixing, pushing on yellows and greens and light reflecting through windows. #art #painting #portrait

I think some of my best paintings come from a very loose approach and relaxed mindset. I can’t always achieve that, but I love when it does come together like that. In this piece, I really wanted to explore some bright and interesting color mixing, pushing on yellows and greens and light reflecting through windows. It was fun to paint and the result was satisfying. This post is all about this…

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Woman in Green Dress Oil Painting

The subject of this post is another figure study on 12 x 12 oil paper. I’ll follow my standard format here, which is to share an image of the painting, the Instagram time lapse, and some verbiage specific to the piece. Then, I’ll embed the YouTube discussion video, including another brief writeup on the topic, materials used, and some other hopefully useful information. I’ll wrap the post up by…

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Ragamuffin Kitten, Giclee Art Print

“Ragamuffin Kitten” – Original oil painting by Jon Amdall using alla prima direct painting technique, Utrecht brushes, Gamblin and Utrecht paints, and Strathmore paper. Art prints are from FinerWorks via Etsy, high resolution prints on Premium Giclee thick (21-mil) heavy weight (310g) paper. Process time-lapse and discussion videos for this piece:

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Pirate Looking Guy, Giclee Art Print

“Pirate Looking Guy” – Original oil painting by Jon Amdall using alla prima direct painting technique, Utrecht brushes, Gamblin and Utrecht paints, and Strathmore paper. Art prints are from FinerWorks via Etsy, high resolution prints on Premium Giclee thick (21-mil) heavy weight (310g) paper. Process time-lapse and discussion videos for this piece:

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Bearded Man, Giclee Art Print

“Bearded Man” – Original oil painting by Jon Amdall using alla prima direct painting technique, Utrecht brushes, Gamblin and Utrecht paints, and Strathmore paper. Art prints are from FinerWorks via Etsy, high resolution prints on Premium Giclee thick (21-mil) heavy weight (310g) paper. Process time-lapse and discussion videos for this piece: