7 Stages of a Mountain Range

After painting a lot of seascapes and water-based motives lately, I decided ut was time to enter the mountains. So I did some searching on the internet, and got inspired by this painting by Kevin Hill, called “The Lonely Barn”.

So for a start, I began by drawing in some outlines on the canvas.

Next, I started to paint in the skyline, by using a mix of sky blue, titanium white and a dash of ivory black to get a grey skyline. I used my fingers to get the first layer of paint on, and then a filbert brush to pain in the clouds with a mix of titanium white and some grey mix from the first layer.

For the mountain I used a mix of ivory black, umbra nature and titanium white, and scraped the paint on by using a pelette knife.

Next, I started to put some snow on the mountain using titanium white for the snow in sunlight and a mix of titanium white, sky blue and ultramarine blue for the snow in the shadowed parts. To get it on the canvas I used a palette knife, sliding the paint lightly down the surface.

To paint in the grassy fields below, and the grass in the foreground, I made different colours mixed together by yellow ochre, sap green, cadmium yellow and titanium white, painting it in with a filbert brush, a fan brush and a flat brush. I also made some tree trunks to work on later on.

It was now time to start painting in the baseline of the old barn, using a mix of umbra nature, burnt sienna, ivory black, yellow ochre and pyrole red. For the roof I used ivory black and titanium white. I first used a palette knife to try and scrape the paint on, in an attempt to get a wood-like feel on it. It did not work very well, so I went over to using a flatbrush, dragging the paint on vertically.

After the groundwork on the barn, I started working on the trees. The problem was, I soon found out, that the paint did´nt stick right to the canvas. The reason was the paint lying behind on the mountains and the grassy fields. It all ended in a blur of colours. So, to my frustration, I decided to let it dry a cuple of days before continuing further.

Being back at it a few days later, I painted in the trees using a mix of sap green and ivory black, highlighting it with a mix of sap green, cadmium yellow and titanium white. To make the barn look more “woody”, I used a mix of burnt sienna and ivory black, highlighting the wood with a mix of titanium white and burnt sienna.

After finishing the barn, I painted in some bushes and trees in front, and a dirt road in the foreground to make some depth.

I also made the trees and the grass in the foreground a bit darker, by painting in a mix using more of sap green and ivory black, to try and get the light more correctly. To highlight the bushes and trees I used a round brush.

It took about 10 hours in total, and all in all I think it went fairly well.