Butterfly in the Home Studio

Here's a new still life set up that I created at home this summer.  The subject is a blue morpho butterfly that I bought in New York from the American Museum of Natural History. It's the amazing  iridescence and sheen of the wings that appeal to me. I want to see how close to the real thing I can get by using an indirect method of painting.

That's where I will first paint the blues as they appear. Then I'll cover them with a layer of white -- the brighter the blue on the wings, the thicker the layer of white that goes on top. Once the white dries, I'll start glazing over the white again with the original blues, using multiple thin and transluscent layers. This should make the blues glow brighter than if I simply mixed blue and white directly. I'm going to try out a few other subtle tricks to help give the illusion of light and a sheeny, slick surface.

In front of the butterfly are three other elements: a pile of powder blue pigment (a souvenir from Rome), a small jar which will be filled partly with linseed oil, and a fan brush dipped in the power and oil. It's the powdered pigment and the oil that are combined to make the paint that we squeeze out in tubes. This manufactured blue itself will never match the magnificence of the butterfly's wing's and perhaps that's the theme to the piece.

My point of observation is about 7 feet from the stand and from the easel. In that spot, I'm facing neither the stand nor the easel directly, and for that reason the cutting board is not perfectly horizontal. In fact, it appears to rise up on one side. I did this deliberately to create more dynamic shadows and angles, to mimic the angles found in the wings.

Below is the quick "dead colour" state of the painting so far whereby paint and mineral spirits combined provide the first thin, "matte" or flat layer of paint.  I'll start on the wings properly next.