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Clinton Broyles is a young artist who appears to have mastered the use of oils in landscapes. He started painting by watching "Bob Ross" on TV when he was beginning High School. Clinton is currently attending college for a degree in Architecture. This smart young man wants to make sure he has a day job to carry him through until he can become a professional artist.  The last painting in this article is the one he did as a demo.  The others are just other examples of his art.

Mr. Broyles' palette for this demonstration only included Titanium White, Cadmium Yellow, Yellow Ochre, Alizarin Crimson and Ivory Black. His colors lay on a palette consisting of tinted glass. Mr. Broyles explained that using this glass to lay his paints on make the colors look brighter. Clinton's demonstration was done using just a palette knife. He has used brushes but is increasing his use of the palette knife. Since he is left-handed we all had a clear view of his demonstration. His canvas was primed in grey paint and he used chalk to sketch his drawing.

Mr. Broyles always works from dark to light as he moves forward in his painting. When painting his sky he used more of a lavender grey color and darkened that color slightly to do his background trees to give it a misty effect. Clinton then darkened the value as he moved into the foreground. He used cadmium yellow mixed with black to add contour to his distant trees for depth. For center trees he started with lighter colors on the outer dimension of the trees and darkened as he moved inward. He then added branches with his darker shadow color. Different colors, such as cadmium yellow light and alizarin crimson, were added to form leaves and enhance highlights and contours. The combination of yellow ochre, black and alizarin crimson gave the leaves a natural- looking green color.

Working on a bush he designated as a focal point, he started with cadmium yellow light and then added red and black to give it more color. When adding detail to the background he started with black then added white to grey it and give more of the misty look for his mid-ground. A greenish tint was then added to lighten it. When adding tree branches, he flattened out the paint and sliced some color off onto the edge of his palette knife. This technique used on a canvas can add natural looking highlights to branches.

Clinton used cadmium yellow light and black for the grass, then added white to add the highlights. He suggests increasing the richness of colors as you move downward in your painting. Bring grass over your water's edge. Do your land in shadow and use more of a purple mix of paint.

When adding water in the distance, use a lighter color. Clinton used an orange mix to highlight and to form rocks on both sides of his water. Then he added a pink mixture for a transitional shadow and cadmium yellow light mix to form a brighter highlight and then added black in areas that needed to be darkened. As he got to the rocks at the forefront he increased the intensity of his colors, not only darkening color value but adding more reds and greens. Finally, he dabbed a little black in areas to add more interest and contrast.

The finished demo painting is at the right.  Like most thumbnails on this site, it can be enlarged by clicking on it.  To see some of his  other painting, visit www.clintonbroyles.com. By general agreement, this was one of the best demos seen at an Art Guild meeting.  Thanks, Clinton, for a great job of both painting and communicating to us your unique techniques.  Thanks also to those who brought refreshments and those who brought their art for show and tell.