Back in Black is the Song

This painting was a fun one.  It had a limited palette, my favorite.  It has great space and light in it.  No smoke, I think this is a no smoke cigarette. 

I started with the background, the dense darkness shot with shafts of white.  I used a lot of Galkyd solvent, so it had very few brush strokes, but I sanded it the next day anyway.  The Galkyd really speeded up the drying time and it was bone dry the next day.  The sanding made the surface extra smooth and left some interesting scratches.  I drew the ashtray and cigarette in with a little Raw Umber, then started fleshing out the ashtray. 

I added more whites back into the table that got lost from the sanding. I started blocking in the darker values in the cigarette and added the blue and all the reflections to the ashtray.

IT'S A STAGE 10"x10" oil on pane

 I like the simplicity of the composition and the drama and space created by the lighting.  I think most of all, I like the idea of painting a black object on a black background. Black on Black, was that a Areosmith song?