Figure painting is fascinating. In terms of skill, painting the human body is marked achievement because our brains are hardwired to recognize faces and bodies for survival and communication. Our brain's eye knows when something looks right and when it looks wrong, even if we can not find the words to describe what's wrong. And painting the body with an Impressionist palette requires observing the quality of three kinds of light: 1) the direct source, like the sun, 2) bounce light reflected from surfaces, and 3) light on forms in cast shadows. I have noticed that nowadays that many painters only paint form which only requires five tonal changes in a color. However, to make the body glow and appear alive one must apply all 3 sources of light, and that's at least a base palette of fifteen different colors from which the rest evolve.
