Caravaggio's St John the Baptist

[Ashtonw]

I am working on copying this work by Caravaggio with acrylics. I'm not experienced with paint and I'm having trouble with the colors (I know the drawing itself has problems that need to be addressed also). I am drawing from a picture in a book. When I was looking for the picture on the internet most of them were redder than they are in book, this picture is the closest match I could find. The skin is pretty golden in my book.

What colors should I try mixing to get the skin right? The background in the original seems to be a warm black, and I tried mixing my own to get away from using tube black, but I used alizarin crimson and phthalo green which was the wrong choice. Is burnt sienna and ultramarine the right black?

I have other questions, relating to figure painting in general. How do I tone down skin tones? Right now I am mixing cadmium yellow, cadmium red, and alizarin crimson to make skin tones, but it seems way more intense than actual skin is. How do I darken skin tones? I have a lot of trouble determining the color of skin in shadow. A professor told me that she never uses brown in skin tones, because it deadens the color, and since then I've avoided using any brown in figure paintings. Was that good advice or does brown have its use?

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[Almighty Chris]

Im a beginner painter myself but here goes:
Some things that might help you while doing this study is to research the pigments that caravaggio himself used. im sure he most likely used a variety of earths such as raw umbers and sienna's. raw sienna is almost a golden brown and i dont believe it deadens skin tones at all. something close to a naples yellow equivalent might be good to mix in with the highlights to keep them warm. Another thing is that you might want to try and secure your drawing as best as you can. a solid foundation makes for a solid painting. theres no point in not planning things out as best as you can especially when youre trying to study caravaggio.

[Ashtonw]

Thank you, I don't have a tube of Naples (http://www.dick-blick.com/items/007/17/swatches/00717_NaplesYellowHue-l.jpg) but I think I certainly should. It looks pretty close to the color the painting.

I really do have a problem with rushing through the foundation of a painting. I'm going to start over.

I've thought of another question- is it beneficial to glaze with acrylics? I had to buy a bottle of glaze for class but I've never really used it. All of my paint is student grade and not good for glazing, anyway.

[MarkHarchar]

Well, to start out, Caravaggio painted in layers. You will not be able to obtain the same deep, dark background and retain the depth without glazing. What you want to do is to lay the darks down in burnt umber and then glaze over top with either ivory black or your dark mixture, (burnt sienna and ultramarine blue, for example.)

As far as the skin tones, make up a chart or squares mixing all the combinations of skin tone colors that you can make. Good options are:
Burnt sienna and white
Venetian red and white
Cad red, cad yellow, white
etc
etc.
Naples yellow and yellow ochre are good to work with as well.
For the shadow area, use you same darker skin mixtures (less white) and add sap green or Payne's grey or possibly Diox purple. You will need to play with these in order to get the combinations that work for you. But make the chart. It will help.

[the_allejo05]

also unless you have an advanced level of drawing i would recomend you ,to do the grid method to get an accurate drawing..so that way you dont worry about the drawing..only about the skin tones..take this in pieces..do a little black and white study , check the composition..perhaps draw the face, then draw the hand on another paper, draw the feet separate..do little studies, this way you are practicing the language used here, also like mentioned about practice the skin tones ,do a little color study, also do a maniquin study to check your geometric perspective and where the light is coming from, there are many fundamentals here that caravaggio already mastered, and even so..he prepared himself just before jumping..meaning drawing, then painting..etc, this sort of master level, takes years to master, so restudy your fundamentals..it will help you on the long run better, then when you are really really advanced takle a copy like this..do you have experience of drawing from life? how much..so you really understand and get the best lessons from this piece. is like learning piano..start with the basics, learn a little song, then copy and learn songs from the best, and then do your own compositions..if not this will be a useless copy, a facsimile, or a photo of it..good luck!

[deepbluehue]

I am trying to tackle Caravaggio's "Sleeping Cupid". It has been very challenging to make charcoal copies of the painting and keep it as close to the original as possible. I feel like I could draw it a dozen times and it would never be as masterful as the original. I plan to copy it in oils.

Please keep this thread going, it's very helpful!

[Elwell]

Some things that might help you while doing this study is to research the pigments that caravaggio himself used.
Excellent advice. From the look of that scan, you could get every color in that painting with earth colors. Even the green foliage looks like a yellow and black mix.
The background in the original seems to be a warm black, and I tried mixing my own to get away from using tube black, but I used alizarin crimson and phthalo green which was the wrong choice. Is burnt sienna and ultramarine the right black?

Since Caravaggio definitely used black, why wouldn't you?

[Ashtonw]

Because I didn't realize he did, and I was trying to practice making my own blacks, but I suppose I should be sticking as close to the original as possible.

deepbluehue, I would like to see your work on the copy.

So much good advice here, I think I am going to learn a lot. :)

[MarkHarchar]

Excellent advice. From the look of that scan, you could get every color in that painting with earth colors. Even the green foliage looks like a yellow and black mix.

Since Caravaggio definitely used black, why wouldn't you?


Elwell, just to be clear for AshtonW though, flat acrylic black applied directly to the background will not achieve the look of Caravaggio's technique. If Black is used, it should be glazed over a raw or burnt umber to achieve some depth. Would you agree or am I wrong and if so, can you explain?

[Elwell]

It's unlikely that any acrylic paint will have the same depth in the darks as oils, simply by nature of the medium. Gloss or gel medium will help. In oils, one would want to underpaint a dark area with something other than ivory black, because of it's transparency and high oil content. In acrylics this is less of an issue.

[deepbluehue]

Is there a translucent earth based yellow? I think yellow ochre is opaque and raw sienna and naples yellow are semi opaque.

[deepbluehue]

If you are curious about how pigments are made, check this out: http://www.webexhibits.org/pigments/indiv/history/yellowochre.html

[Almighty Chris]

The only transparent Yellow I know of Is called aurelion(sp?) winsor and newton has an indian yellow deep which is a transparent yellow. But these are oil paints, I dont know if there is an acrylic alternative.

[Burl]

Just to add a footnote; not directly linked to Caravaggio but is useful anyway - http://www.sanders-studios.com/instruction/tutorials/historyanddefinitions/techniques.html#anchorfleshtones