GREEN and How to Mix It
by Stefan Baumann
When I demonstrate for art groups or I conduct my location classes at The Grand View Ranch, the most pressing question that artists ask me is how to mix great greens or what I call MGG. For centuries, this has been the elusive Holy Grail for inspiring artists. Because green is often the most common color used in landscape paintings, the painter who wishes to excel must learn to MGG. Painting with green has been the subject of many books, and is the leading problem that artists must overcome if they want to paint a great landscape.
Because there are so many formulas for mixing greens, art companies make a fortune by premixing greens for the unsuspecting student who is in search of the secret of mastering green in their paintings. Selecting the right tube color can be overwhelming and may detract from the overall effectiveness of your painting, because Green is made of Blue and Yellow, and the more proficient you are at mixing a basic green color, the quicker you will be able master all the subtleties of utilizing green in a painting. First, notice the greens that appear in the landscape that you want to paint. Some of the greens are cool greens and some are warm. Make a mental note about where these colors are found in your painting, and do not stray from your first intention to include both cool and warm greens. Then, as you mix your blue and yellow paints, choose a green that becomes your “base green,” and use this color as the starting point for the variety of greens that you use in your painting. If all of the greens in your painting begin with the same base color, they will have a “familial resemblance” that will unify your composition. Also, add a bit of red (like Alizarin, or a red brown like Burnt Sienna) into the cool and warm mixtures of green to tone the greens. You may also paint in bits of pure red such as cad red light next to the greens (complementary colors) to stimulate the green and make it vibrate. This is the method that impressionist painters used when recreating light in their paintings.
In my painting, “Summering Buck at The Grand View,” the foreground seemed warmer than the background even though the light source was cool, so I made the foreground greens warmer by adding touches of yellow and orange. As I moved away from the foreground, I used lighter and bluer shades of green that appear cooler.
A good practice to use when exploring MGG is not to paint with green at all. I paint by mixing my green with bluish colors such as cobalt and ultramarine for the shadows, and likewise, I create my warm greens by using bits of yellow and orange to suggest warmth and light. This is not an easy exercise but one worth trying. By carefully varying the base color of Green to make warm and cool tones, or varying light and dark values for contrast, or adding yellow, orange, white or blue to create interesting foregrounds and backgrounds, Green can creatively replicate many different features of a landscape. How can you trust the complex process of painting the colors you see to a premixed green out of a tube? Instead, enjoy taking total creative control and Mix Great Greens yourself!
