David King Studio: Layers of Texture

My artwork lately has been largely about experimentation even if the finished piece doesn't look that much different than my usual style, like this one:

art painting landscape autumn fall texture

"Take the High Road"
Acrylic, 16" X 20"

This composition was inspired by a scene at Wheeler Farm in Murray Utah. It's not a copy of that scene, but rather the scene gave me the idea for this composition. I often go for walks around the property at Wheeler Farm and see potential compositions all over. I took a couple photos of this area of Wheeler to reference but I actually made a couple thumbnail sketches to test ideas and to focus on the idea that appealed to me, which was primarily the dirt road leading up into the distance around a bend around some trees on a slope.

I finished this painting with my typical application of thick paint using knives but under that was some experimenting.

WIP #1

This first stage was typical, just blocking in the composition with brushes. This is when I make sure all my lights and darks as well as the colors are work well, though I allow myself to make adjustments later as you can see some differences from the finished painting.

WIP #2

Now you can see some experimenting going on. I added some drips using acrylic ink. I also added some high flow acrylic to add some splatters and put some into a small squeeze bottle with a needle tip and used that to add a bunch of lines, in particular in the tree to create small "branches". I also applied some gel medium and formed it with a palette knife, that's the white stuff you see in the photo, (it dries clear).

WIP #3

Here I've started to apply thick paint with knives, in fact it's over 2/3 finished at this point. You can also see one other little experiment at this stage, the yellow lines you see in the bushes were added using a paint marker.

Here are some close up detail images of the finished piece.