I got a bug up whatever and decided I wanted to paint children's portraits. After my adventures in child portraiture, that bug has been smashed. I asked one of my niece's for permission to paint portraits of her grandchildren (my great-great niece and nephew. She happily obliged sending me photos from which I chose the following pictures:
First I painted my ggniece and it was a struggle. It had been over 30 years since I had painted a portrait in acrylic or oil paints. Pencils, pastels, yes. With pencils it's as if they are extensions of my fingers. With paints, well, in
my video to which there is a link under ggnephew's portrait as well, I describe the process as using my brush as a magic wand trying to lay out the palette and determine the colors. Hermione Granger I am not. Well I finished the painting and it's her face. I made the smile less posed making it less like the photograph. I was pleased. My niece was pleased.
I waited a few days to tackle the portrait of ggnephew. When I did, though, I had as many misgivings about this project as I had with the first. Oh I have painted many beautiful paintings in acrylic but portraits are a different type of landscape. Children's portraits more so. But I went ahead and if you watch
the video (it's just over 20 minutes) you'll see all the changes I made because the painting just wasn't right. In the end I had this lovely boy to show for my efforts. Again, I softened the smile so that it seemed more natural. My niece loved this one as well.
The cool thing that I did was chose two 9 x 12 gallery wrapped (Artist's Loft level 3 about $17 each) so that framing wasn't necessary and they could stand on an even surface like a book shelf or table. Check out
my short to see how they work. They are sooo cool. Not cheap but they do save money on framing. And many companies make them for more and less money.
I used Sennelier Extra Fine Acrylic Paint which is a heavy body paint though not has heavy as Liquitex which heavy body paints. Sennelier dries more quickly and requires less water than the Liquitex paints but I would use Liquitex for palette painting over Sennelier; if I ever do palette painting again.
So, I'm taking a break from painting right now and resting my head by drawing. Sometimes, color gets in the way and when it does it makes me dizzy. Had I done these portraits in shades of gray it would have been much easier for me.
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