24 Apr Martine Portrait finished!
At last, I finished the painting on Sunday. It has been a bit of a journey to get here – I have painted Martine’s portrait four times over before getting something I am happy with, as I wanted it to speak. All the previous versions are evident in some format under the final painting, where I have scraped away and rubbed out the previous attempts over and over again! An x-ray of the painting would be interesting to see.
It has been a challenge working from one drawing, however, I have persevered and hopefully have put my own stamp on it.
The mediums I have used are Acrylic and Oil on canvas and the piece is 800mm x 1070mm. It will be framed along with the second canvas and will hang to its right. The action painting is the same height x 1370mm width and I have prepared the canvas for painting.
I will be attending one of Martine’s training sessions this coming Sunday, so I can get started on this.
I emailed the painting to Martine yesterday and just heard back from her today to say she loves it – what a relief, I am so glad. Also emailed the final version to Michael Petry too and he loves it too, so all good, now I am spurred on to enjoy the rest of the work.
Very happy!
Richard Waldron
Posted at 11:00h, 02 MayA very expressive work Catherine. Well done. The big sweeps of brush against the detail of drawing make for a better result than have so many portraits where the artist’s feelings about the subject are largely hidden. The use of thinly applied acrylic – almost as water-colour – seems to suit you. Have you used the interactive ones? They allow for blending and reworking after drying.
Cathy
Posted at 11:47h, 04 MayThanks Richard, I really appreciate your comments, it is really interesting to hear how you think I have created the layers. I painted the portrait x 4 times until I was happy with it, using oil, then rubbing it out, then oil, then rubbing it out again, then acrylic (too flat), then turning it upside down and then scraping away what became an oval, quite by accident and then I drew back the face and used liquidy oil washes over the face, as I used to do in my previous oil portrait paintings (see archive). I wanted the drawing to be the star here and hope to have captured some emotion from the day I spent with Martine in the piece. I then realised it was finished and should not be tempted to touch it again! The x 4 previous attempts are still evident on the piece which I think add to it and give it some depth/interest. I’m on with the action painting now and have already drawn it up on the canvas, working from the sketches I made at the training on Sunday and some snaps I took, to remind me of the colours etc.