oil painting

I am teaching myself how to make oil paintings. In turn, this oil painting is teaching me patience. Great...

I just found out today that if I want to complete the painting I am working on with a varnish, matte or gloss, which is highly recommended. I must wait several months before the painting will be dry enough to do that. This is not good news. Several months? And even then, applying the varnish is a process.

I am not sure that I'm cut out for oils. The website bluntly stated that if you are having trouble waiting several months until you can apply the varnish then you should paint with acrylics.

Furthermore, I also found out that certain colors take several weeks to dry. This is true. When I painted the first layers of the painting it took over 2 weeks for the painting to dry. I did not expect that and thought that I had done something wrong. I decided to read a little bit about oil painting since I found myself in the middle of one. No, I didn't really do anything wrong. Also, some colors have different drying times. You must not put a color that has a faster drying time under a color with a slower one. This is becoming very complicated.

Then, I realized that I wanted it to have that shiny, vibrant look and vaguely remembered from my art history classes that you must put something called varnish on the painting. So today, I found out that after I finally feel inspired enough to finish the thing I must wait several months until I can varnish it. I did not expect this.

I don't really know what I painted. I only used two colors. A yellow and a green. And one brush - even though you are supposed to have a multitude of brushes, elixirs, potions, various tools, palettes, scrapers and I don't know what else.

This mess of an oil painting has dominated my dining room table since....I don't really remember when actually. Sometime in October.

Hopefully I will finish it by the end of the year, and then in June I can varnish it. Ok, that's an exaggeration. I should be able to varnish in February/March. This thing better be good. There is so much pressure now. I was encouraged that one friend really liked it. When Jessi saw it, she really wanted to have it, even in its unfinished state. I was surprised.

I now realize why so many people use acrylics. I used to hold it against artists when I'd see that they used acrylics. I still prefer oils, but I did not know that several weeks and months were required in between the stages. It's quite the chemistry experiment.

Subject of the painting? I did not have a plan. I just wanted to paint yellow and green. I studied all the versions of yellow and green paints for a very long time at the store.... (that took time too) Now that it's taking shape it sort of looks like the northern lights I saw once upon a time over the Atlantic.