Ms Grunt's Studio Portfolio II Sample Artwork

Alla Prima Large Oil Paintings

Penn Wood High School

The large oil paintings on view represent the culmination of two years of training in the Studio Portfolio course sequence.  Students have gained experience with value, color, perspective and composing strong compositions, enabling them to tackle these larger-scale works.  Since there are only four still-life set-ups in the room at a time, please also note how students working from the same still-life setups find unique ways to depict them.  

These paintings are refered to as 'alla prima' oil paintings, or the 'direct paint' method, because students do not create a tonal underpainting for this project. Unlike the traditional meaning of 'alla prima', it does take more than one sitting to complete this assignment, therefore students 'oil in' sections allowing them to work over a longer period of time while somewhat mimicking working into wet paint. These painitngs are typically 24" on at least one edge or larger.