This week I decided to take a break, step away from the paintings on the easel, and do something for myself. This is a portrait miniature representative of traditional late eighteenth century style. It is watercolor on ivory (old piano key) with a sealing varnish of DaMar. The painting style does not model strictly after that taught at the Philadelphia academy but is vaguely reminiscent of regional influences. Of course the smiling countenance is purely this artist’s prerogative. The subject is my husband. Enjoy.

I have had a busy week and no time at the easel until today. Compounding this, sometimes it is hard to get going when I am distracted by all of the usual demands of the day to day still lurking in my mind. But I finally got down to work and some of the slight detail issues in the face are beginning to settle. I started to work on the hands a little today too.
Technically, it is dangerous to focus on one area of a painting and let others languish like I have been doing with the hands. Color palette can drift, detail can be different from area to area, the whole painting can loose continuity. Let’s hope I can avoid these pitfalls.
I hope you’re having fun…I am.

Not every day is fruitful. Not ever session spent at the easel is as fruitful as others. I worked on the face today and made a little progress forward and see a few things now I need to fix. Sometimes life pressures get in the way of faster progress but that is all part of the process too. Another day might be better.

I don’t always stop painting to post process but just take a quick picture with my phone and move on, causing several steps in one day. I also must admit I do not devote the whole day to the easel – much as I would love to. Instead, I paint a little and go clean my house a little because itis Saturday and the light is as good for dust bunnies as it is for painting. This is the second sitting and I decided to begin to add a little detail to the face. Not only does this start to settle the real size of the flat shapes, but it helps me relax and plan where it needs to go next. Once the afternoon light forces me to stop feeling guilty about the dusting I haven’t finished I will probably do a third session today and will post progress. I hope you’re having fun watching.

The composition was feeling pretty off so I thought I would look at what I could do to unite the two islands of warmth, the face and the hands. I decided that what I needed to do is pull them together with angles and geography – meaning make the figure hunch over a little closer to pull the pieces closer. This also meant I needed to work on the scale or proportional relationship between the two. I am actually oversize now on the hands but that’s what ‘working’ on a painting is all about.