Grisaille

The practice of making a tonal underpainting in one colour
by Joy Tickell

The word ‘Grisaille’ comes from the French ‘gris’, for grey, so is literally a grey scale painting.
However, this term is used even if the underpainting is done using another colour - often burnt
umber. Painting a grisaille allows the artist to focus on the tonal values (degree of light or dark)
without the complications of colour. When working in colour it can be easy to misjudge the
actual tonal value.

An ancient art
The concept of Grisaille started hundreds of years ago when pigments were scarce. Old
masters used it as a first stage of an oil painting, which was then glazed over to achieve
luminosity in their work. Glazing is when transparent layers of paint are used over opaque
layers. Rembrandt, amongst others, was a great exponent of this method of working. The light
can then travel through the transparent layers and be reflected back from the opaque
underlayers of the grisaille giving greater depth of colour.

The underpainting was done by covering the white canvas (or other surface) with a slightly
diluted paint. The paint is then wiped away in the light areas of the image to reveal the white
surface below. A tonal underpainting is then built up by adding white and black to the paint to
build up the various tones.

One of the best examples of Grisaille in modern art is Picasso’s ‘Guernica’ painting.

One of the downsides of using a grisaille is that the final colours may be less vivid. However this
can be overcome by using a mixture of glazing techniques as well as using opaque colours to
enhance these less vivid areas.

Although this method was traditionally used in oil painting it can also be used in acrylic and
watercolour. Often a grisaille piece is left as a stand alone artwork, without the addition of
colour, and this is known as a classic grisaille.

How to approach grisaille
I have attempted to show how this method can be used to paint a box of oranges. I am not an
expert so please do take time to investigate how experts do it properly!!! I have used oils for my
example.

Step by step guide
​In diagram 1 you can see how I have made an initial sketch of the image.

​In diagram 2 I have made a basic grisaille using burnt umber with black and white to get my
tonal underpainting. I could have gone to much more trouble using more tones but as this is
only an example I didn’t spend too much time on it.

Diagram 1: Initial sketch

Diagram 2: Burnt umber with black and white

In diagram 3 I have used glazes of orange on the fruit, french ultramarine on the box and green
on the leaves. You can see already how easy it is to bring life to the underpainting.

In diagram 4 I have wiped away some of the orange glaze where I want the lightest areas of the
image to be.

Diagram 3: First glaze

Diagram 4: wiping away orange glaze to make the lightest areas

In diagram 5 I have used a glaze of cadmium yellow over the highlight areas of the oranges.
I have also used a glaze of green gold on the leaves and burnt sienna on the wooden crate. I
could keep adding layers and add some opaque highlights to really give it some bling.

Diagram 5: coloured glazes added

For my glazes I diluted my oil with a little liquin. There are glazing mediums available or you can
research how to make your own by browsing the web.
​
I hope this will inspire you to have a go at this technique. Do send your examples so that we can
post them on our website for all to see!!