More Lupines – A Miniature Plein Air Painting

Lupine Colors, 4×4 oil – sold

detail

I don’t often do miniature paintings.  Some of my readers may argue with that, knowing my propensity for 5x7s.  But once in awhile, duty calls.  I was given a beautiful, 4-inch, hand-carved frame, and was asked to fill it.

So fill it I did – with lupines, en plein air.  I painted this on a piece of acid-free matboard that had been prepared with Gamblin PVA size and two coats of acrylic gesso.  The piece of matboard was much larger than the frame.  (I taped it to a 5×7 board and used my new Guerrilla Painter 5×7 Pocket Box.)  To make sure I was going to get a painting that would work, I first lightly pencilled a 4-inch square on the board.  Then, I centered my composition in the square but actually painted an area that went way beyond it.  I think I painted an extra two inches all the way around.  This gave me plenty of room to play with the final composition, cropping to suit.

Once I’d cropped the painting to size, I let it dry, sprayed a coat of retouch varnish on it, and then used a piece of acid-free foamboard for backing.   I did not use glass, since I consider the matboard/foamboard combination is more like a panel than paper.  (Works on paper typically get put under glass.)

By the way, the highlights on the flowers were done with Gamblin’s Radiant Blue and Radiant Pink.

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Michael Chesley Johnson, PSA MPAC PSNM
www.MichaelChesleyJohnson.com