Steven Assael Oil Painting Demo

I received an email the other day inviting me to attend an oil painting demo by Steven Assael. I've always admired his work but whenever I had the opportunity to see his demo something comes up. This year I decided to give it a try and luckily got a spot!

The demo started at 12:00 and there must have been about 25 people sitting around the easel in a half circle. There was a large screen which projected a detailed view of his process as he worked.

He started with a bright orange/red ground of acrylic on board. He said he never uses acrylic on canvas, only on board. He had a pile of brushes of every kind and said he uses whatever he needs at the time. His palette was clipped to board in a vertical manner and I can't believe I never thought of that. It's a great idea.

He made sure to divide the board into grids to insure a strong composition. I learned a lot just by watching this process. He used a paper towel to blend and smooth out the paint and started laying in the darks and then the lights.

He cross-hatched color over and over using a variety of every brush in an almost violent motion, with his whole arm, flicking paint. This part of the process looks awesome by itself!

He continued tightening up the painting.

He finished around 5:00PM. The photo I took of the final painting isn't great because there were people crowding to get a shot of it. He did a spectacular job. What a fantastic painter! And he gave the finished piece to the model!

Here are some notes I took, along with a sketch I made of the model. She did a fantastic job.

During one of the breaks I was chatting with Steven and I showed him this sketch I made of him painting. He said "Great drawing!" I think that comment made my year. HAHA! If you look at the bottom of the sketch you'll see some red paint. That's from shaking his hand. Maybe some of that talent will get transfered into me! LOL