Wednesday, June 9, 2021

A PORTRAIT ADVENTURE

A few years ago, a client asked me to do a portrait of her grandchild. She provided the photograph and wanted a realistic rendering of it. This was fairly straight forward. I did use a grid to draw the portrait on the canvas, and I used digital overlays on the computer to check and adjust my painting to get a likeness.




Then, a few years later, a client asked me to paint a portrait of an old Zambian man that he had photographed years ago in Zambia. This man had walked about 500 km on foot to sort out family matters. This was the only photograph he had of the man. The client wanted me to give my own artistic interpretation to the portrait. Hmmm, this was an adventure waiting to happen!




I looked at some portraits done by artists I admire, for inspiration.


Very inspiring portrait of Mandela by Artist Jimmy Law


I researched some Zambian landscapes on the internet.

I was going to use it in the background.

 Then, I started with a loose painting, just to get the feel of it:


So far I was happy.

I added more detail. Freehand, just to get the main idea. 
Added some "Zambian" landscape in the background. 



Made a few changes, simplifying:



Wasn't sure where I was going with this...
So I tried to liven it up with colour, thinking of my initial inspiration...



It just wasn't gelling with me.
It needed something more. More boldness and freedom...
I added drips....



At this point I put the painting away. For a good few weeks, if I remember correctly.
Then, when I took it out again, I realised that I didn't need the background (which was a dilemma for me: What do I put in the background??) After all, the whole story was being told by this man's face! So why don't I just crop the whole painting down to his face?

So, I turned the canvas into a portrait format and proceeded to draw the face freehand with loose, bold brushstrokes. Suddenly it felt right. I could see that the features needed correction, but I had achieved the looseness and boldness I was after. Eureka!

(Photo is darker than what painting was, I think)

All I needed to do now, was to correct and adjust and add detail!
 And, voila! a finished portrait!








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