Bold Strokes: Dynamic Brushwork in Oils and Acrylics

Make Your Mark with Confident, Dramatic Strokes

Imagine painting with the virtuosity of the masters. With Bold Strokes, you can learn how, step by step. Beloved artist and teacher Mark Christopher Weber takes this seemingly complex manner of painting and breaks it down into simple, manageable steps that you can apply to your own style. He starts with the very basics so you can achieve success no matter what your skill level. Full-color photos and numbered steps illustrate in-depth instruction covering: Tools and Materials: everything you need from brushes to paint, including a section highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of both oils and acrylicsBrushwork Basics: learn the mechanics of shaping brushes, loading paint and applying strokes for loose and expressive brushworkThe Bold Challenge: use five basic strokes to manipulate thick paint and limit the number of overall strokes for heightened dramatic effectMark provides many engaging ways to practice these basic strokes and brushwork techniques. Next, he helps you develop your new skills as you apply them to a series of step-by-step demonstrations. You'll deepen your understanding of: Drawing and Measuring: get a quick primer of these essential skills, plus new methods for using them to achieve bold strokes in every compositionThe Power of Suggestion: learn to identify the primary elements of your subjects so you can reduce every composition to its essential focus and place bold strokes in the most effective placesPractice and Perfection: apply what you've learned to a range of compositions in both oils and acrylics, including landscapes, flowers, animals, portraits, figures and more so you can go forward in your own style with new vision and skillEvery nuance is revealed in glowing detail. In no time, you'll use Bold Strokes to create a sense of motion, capture dazzling highlights, deliver emotional impact, produce lively color variations, and much more.

Bold brushwork requires a lot of thought and practice to develop mental skills before it becomes a natural part of painting. Bold Strokes gives the reader a process to acquire confident brush skills faster, eliminating months or years of practice time. Hereas how it works: the reader is given a limited amount of time to do the initial drawing/wash-in stage before moving on to the block-in stage, which also has a time limit. Once those stages are complete, the reader is permitted a limited number of final strokes that cannot be altered. The key is to get the reader to think about each stroke before making it.