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Thoughts On Using A Limited Palette

Former Palette Colors

Cad Yellow Light

Cad Yellow Medium
Ultramarine Blue
Alizarin Crimson
Cad Red Light
Cadmium orange
Viridian Green
Yellow Ochre

Ice Blue (Richeson)
Burnt Sienna
Naples Yellow
Naples Reddish Yellow (Lukas)
St. Remy Blue (Charvin)
Flesh Color (Lucas)
Beige (Lucas)
Titanium Buff on occasion

Soft Mixing White (Winston)

 

 

Limited Palette Colors

 

Cadmium Yellow Lemon (Gamblin)

Permanent Red Medium (Rembrandt)

Ultramarine Blue Deep (Rembrandt)

Naples Yellow Deep (Rembrandt)

Cold Mixing Gray (Rembrandt)

Titanium White  (Any brand)

 

Well, it has been a month of the limited palette and I haven’t given up on it yet I do have a few thoughts to share. Surprisingly, I only missed a few specific colors. While I could make a warm brown using the three primaries in my limited palette, it didn’t seem to have the vibrancy of burnt sienna that I really enjoy using in some of the shadowed areas of the animals I paint. It seems to be perfect as it is dark enough and also suggests the warmth of a living being. I lasted about a week using the titanium white and returned to Winston’s soft mixing white. I paint many animals with white fur and it is the perfect consistency for this artist. I was shocked that I could last without alizarin crimson as it has been a staple on my palette for over twenty years! I found that I was able to mix something similar using the Rembrandt red medium and ultramarine blue deep. All greens were made using the primaries and at times white and Naples yellow deep. Warmer reds can be made using the red and yellow or red and Naples yellow. They are less intense than cadmium orange but I liked them and in relation to all the other colors were lovely. Flesh, titanium buff, and beige can all be mixed. Yellow ochre is pretty easy to make using the yellow with a little blue too. For skies and water, I would use a little viridian and ultramarine blue with white in my old palette but found that ultramarine deep with white worked for skies and a little lemon yellow added to ultramarine sufficed for the water and a little white in places. The ice blue on my former palette was a light gray but I just mixed gray using ultramarine blue, orange that I had mixed and white. Much more on the blue and white to create gray. So, will I stick with it? The jury is still out and I will continue working with this palette until at least all the tubes are gone because it is challenging and I believe it is a great learning experience and teaching tool. One of the reasons, I chose to do this was to explore mixing grays and I have only scratched the surface on this. I highly recommend trying this especially if you are new to color and mixing paint. Getting your values correct is so important and limiting your palette really does simplify the process and allows you to focus your energies there. In another month or so, I will let you know if I have added any colors back on my palette. If you have tried the limed palette, I’l love to hear from you in the comments!

Here is one of my favorite pieces that has sold and was painted using the limited palette. As I said in the last post, I prime my canvas with cadmium red light acrylic so that does show in many of my paintings. I experimented with using cadmium yellow medium acrylic as Kathleen Dunphy uses but am still partial to the red. :-)