Painting into the Light: How to work atmospheric magic with your oil paints [Paperback]

Known for her techniques for painting light on water, Jenny Aitken delivers perfect guidance to the intermediate artist on how to paint light in plein air and much more.

Learn how to successfully paint scenes that that capture magical effects of light from behind the subject.  Good contre-jour – painting into the light – artworks cause the viewer to squint, with light seeming to glow from the canvas. They can look like a kind of magic, with their hazy light and colour singing out. This book demystifies lighting in oils, and provides a practical guide to the process, showing exactly how to create the illusion.

Inside, you'll find a wealth of information on simplification, tonal control, capturing accurate color, working both indoors and outdoors, painting landscapes and still life, creating atmospheric depth, and even mastering the illusion of space. Through detailed step-by-step demonstrations and beautifully illustrated techniques, Jenny Aitken reveals how to infuse every painting with vibrant, lifelike light. A section on troubleshooting tricky paintings will show the reader every painting is salvageable, but with an understanding of light and colour, it’s much more likely that they’ll find success the first time round.Art Book Review - May 2024

Contre jour is a tricky technique to pull off successfully and, let’s be honest, not something you’re going to attempt every day. I think we can therefore file this under “niche”. Sometimes, however, the subject you want only works in a certain light and that’s where Jenny comes to the rescue.

This is actually about a lot more than just working with the sun in your eyes and is, in fact, a rather good guide to handling light in general. It’s worth noting at this point that Jenny is an oil painter but evenlÓ'