Description
Nude III – a red dress over a shifting ground
Wall art braces both hands on the hips so the arms shut into a pair of hard angles beside a red dress that opens downward into a bell; behind her the wall passes out of grey, through gold, into a warm orange: painting on canvas where the figure is still and everything behind it is not.
Technique and texture
Wet into wet, then wiped back with a soft cloth: that is how the ground was made, so one colour becomes the next without a border anywhere. The dress is the opposite case: flat red, one coat, no trace of the tool that put it there. Two small dark buttons at the centre are the only places where the paint physically stands off the canvas.
The motif
The silhouette is strictly symmetrical and the ground behind it is not, which is what keeps the composition from going inert. The dress owns the middle third and the eye travels down its edge to the hem. No face is given, so what you read is a stance.
Setting and placement
Grey and white rooms are what this one was made for, because the gold and orange in the ground do the warming that the room itself does not. Leave clear wall on either side of it; the bell of the dress needs somewhere to open into.
- Technique: hand-painted painting on canvas, wet-into-wet ground wiped with a cloth, flat single-coat dress, two raised buttons
- Palette: red, gold, warm orange, grey, cream
- Ideal for: living rooms, bedrooms, dressing rooms
- Character: poised, warm, symmetrical
Choose the size that suits your wall.
