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How to paint a Beautiful Landscape

By Mark Horton Last Updated: February 2, 2023

If you wonder how to fill your landscape with depth, space, air, and volume, this landscape painting tutorial will be quite interesting for you.

This art lesson deals with very important things that should be known and used by every beginning artist when painting a landscape. If you paint with oil, acryl, or pencils, these rules will certainly come in handy and be useful to you.

The landscape and the perspective should not be separated. It is impossible to paint a good landscape not using the rules of aerial and linear perspective.

So let’s come over to the first part of our landscape painting lesson

The Aerial Perspective

The aerial perspective is necessarily present in any landscape. So what is an aerial perspective? Literally and simply speaking, the rules of aerial perspective tell that:

The further the object or item is from the observer – the less clear it is seen. Thus, the further the object is from us – the less clear it should be drawn.

Foreground and Background

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The landscape painting by Levitan – Spring in Italy. The flowers on the branches and the boards of a wooden fence can be seen in the foreground; the further they are from the observer – the less clear shapes and brushstrokes are.
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The painting «Thaw». The trees and the skyline are barely observable in the background. The trunks, branches, and even small twigs are seen well in the foreground.

 

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When it comes to the foreground, you can draw everything in detail (house bricks, patterns, wood texture, flowers, the roughness of tree trunks, automobile constructions…), using saturated paints. The further you move to the depth of the forest or city – the less clear you should depict the objects or miss the details, using the less bright colors and adding a light haze.

If you keep everything 100% focus on your landscape, the viewer will get confused and the appropriate question will arise: “What is the main thing in this painting?” It is uncharacteristic for the human`s eye to see the flower, which is near, and the flower, which is 20 steps from it, equally clear.

The aerial perspective makes the work more voluminous, spacious and airy.

The next step of our landscape painting lesson plan is

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The Color in the Aerial Perspective

The second rule of aerial perspective reveals the answer to the question of why this kind of perspective has been called «the aerial perspective».

Everything on our planet is surrounded by air. Accordingly, the further the object is from us – the more air is applied to it. The object, which is far away, gets the color of the airspace, where it is located, for the observer.

The Painting Examples in the Aerial Perspective

makovoe-pole
The landscape painting « Poppy Field». The bushes, hills, and fields, which are far away, have acquired the warm pink-orange shade of sunset sky, and sun.
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The landscape painting by I. Levitan. The trees and hills, which are far away, are covered with a haze of the gray cloudy sky.
art lesson, landscape, fild, paint
The landscape painting «Cypresses in the mountains ». The mountains, which are far away seem to be blue.

The gloomier the sky – the more its color and light will be transmitted to everything around. If you paint the foggy morning, rainy or snowy landscape, there should be more haze and inexpressiveness afar. You can easily “blur” everything that is located far off from the observer.

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In the daylight the aerial perspective can be schematically shown in the following way:

 

The schematic representation of aerial perspective in the daylight. These are just the lines but they look like a landscape.

The rule of the aerial perspective: the brown located afar becomes green and the green, when moving away, loses its intensity and turns into blue or light blue.

And now let`s come over to the next part of our drawing art lesson –

The Linear Perspective

The linear perspective in conjunction with the aerial one will help to create an even more realistic landscape – the proper image which is well and easily perceived.

The main rule of linear perspective: all the parallel lines are converged in the landscape.

The Schemes of Linear Perspective

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The linear perspective — all the parallel lines are converged. The initial stage of work on the urban landscape
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«Autumn alley» by L. Afremov. The linear perspective is clearly seen.

When you paint a row of similar trees, lanterns, columns and houses in linear perspective, all of them will visually shrink, going far into the perspective, and the distance between these objects will also be reduced.

For example, «Rainy alley» in Afremov style:

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afremov, hoe to paint, ptrspectiv, landscape, art lesson
The painting «Rainy alley»: each of the following lanterns is closer to the previous one.

 

The painting «Rainy alley»: each of the following lanterns is closer to the previous one.

The white line is the skyline, the green spot in the center is the vanishing point and the red lines signify the height of lanterns.

Finally, we are coming over to the last stage of our free painting lesson online –

The Perspective and the Perception

When painting something in the linear perspective, you should know and understand that the glance of the viewer will always follow the alley, road, or path and come to the vanishing point.

Make the way, which the viewer`s glance follow, interesting, bright and diverse. It should not be monotonous and boring. Or you can depict something more important and interesting for the viewer in the place where the road converges into one point.

The Example of Paintings

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The painting «Mountains in bloom». The mountain road leads the glance to the house located afar.
how to draw, how to paint, landscape, art lesson
The painting «The gardens are blooming». The observer looks from the hill to the path leading to the hills afar.

 

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If you know and comply with these several simple rules on the work with a landscape, it will help you avoid the blunders and create beautiful and harmonious landscapes filled with depth, space, and air.
Thus, our landscape painting lesson is over.

I wish you good luck and new success in your creative work!

Contents

  • 1 The Aerial Perspective
    • 1.1 Foreground and Background
    • 1.2 The Color in the Aerial Perspective
    • 1.3 The Painting Examples in the Aerial Perspective
  • 2 The Linear Perspective
    • 2.1 The Schemes of Linear Perspective
  • 3 The Perspective and the Perception
    • 3.1 The Example of Paintings

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About Mark Horton

I'm Mark, an artist. I love to create pieces that make people feel something, whether it's happiness, sadness, or anger. I want my artwork to evoke a reaction in people and get them thinking about the world around them.

I grew up in a small town in Texas and always loved art. I would spend hours doodling in my notebooks during class and experimenting with different mediums. After high school, I decided to pursue art as a career and never looked back.

I've had several solo exhibitions throughout the United States, and my work has been featured in several magazines and online publications. I'm currently working on a series of paintings that explore the refugee crisis.

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