Saddle Stool

Saddle Stool

When I want to concentrate on painting at my easel, the most important thing is what I am sitting on. 

As I am disabled, (I had polio when I was a baby giving me paralysis in my right leg) my gluteus maximus on my left is much bigger than the one on my right. This means that I am lopsided when I sit. Sitting can be very painful, giving me, not backache, but waist ache. So I buy a lot of working chairs, in hopes of finding a comfortable one. My last purchase was a lovely chair but a disaster for me to sit on. I kept tipping sideways and my waist and leg ached with the effort of trying to stay vertical. 

I have been thinking about getting a saddle stool for a long time and yesterday this noble stool arrived (photo above). So far remaining vertical is no problem at all. Getting on it can be awkward because of the hump at the front. Does one call it a pommel on a stool? But I am getting the hang of it and once I am in front of the easel I feel secure and can concentrate on painting and not pain.

The cats are giving the saddle stool dirty looks. It isn’t good for curling up and sleeping. 

I have returned to the painting of Arthur. I am improving four of my portraits in oils on canvas to put into the Art in the Hills exhibition in Dufton Village Hall later this month. The portrait part of the photo has got bleached out by the sunshine so you can’t see what alterations I have made, but I have added a mixture of burnt umber and prussian blue into the shadows and Arthur’s shirt has come to life. I am so pleased with it that I am going to add some prussian blue to the shadows on his face. 

Because the exhibition is coming up soon, I have bought some quick drying mediums. I have 3 different makes to try. First I bought Winsor and Newton Artisan fast drying medium but I didn’t like the smell. So I have bought bottles of Holbein Duo Aqua quick drying liquid, which doesn’t have a smell, and Royal Talens Cobra quick drying medium. I haven’t opened the Cobra one yet because I read that it causes yellowing and also I prefer the consistency of the Duo Aqua paints so it is natural for me to use their medium first. 

You may well prefer the Cobra paints if you come from painting in traditional oil paints. I started by working in dry pastel and the Duo Aqua paints have a drier consistency. I even blend them with my fingers on the canvas sometimes as I would in pastel. 

The reason why I stopped painting in pastel is that I got post polio syndrome and couldn’t grip my pastels. Post polio syndrome is when bits of me that had been working (in this case my right hand) stopped working. I have recovered to the point where I can hold pencils and paintbrushes, and I have tried pastel pencils which have improved a lot since the days when I painted exclusively in pastel, but pastels have to be framed and framing is expensive. Oil on canvas doesn’t need to be framed, which is an important consideration when painting for an exhibition.