Posts tagged ·
women
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I don’t normally use the photographs of others as the basis for my paintings, but I saw a picture of this lovely young woman so wrapped up in her music and it moved me. I just had to paint her. Fortunately for me, the photographer August Miller was willing to let me use his amazing photo in return for a donation to a The Rape Recovery Center. That I was happy to do, and here is the painting.

Summer Shoppers (11 x 12) $150.00
This could be anywhere. What I liked about my photo was the sunshine and the interaction between the young women.

Poured Version
I intended to pour a very atmospheric painting, and I did pour one reserving only the womens skin for direct painting. But I was unhappy with the reflections in the windows and the draping of the sundress. I really liked the bright pinks, oranges and yellows I got through pouring though. So at the gallery yesterday, I repainted the image using not only my photo, but also the poured painting as a guide.
For most of the painting I used hansa yellow light, new gamboge, quinacridone deep red rose, and phthalo blue. Using two yellow helped keep things bright. I added burnt sienna to the hair and the leather bag.
I tried to keep most of the poured feeling by mixing the paints freely on the paper. I added the windows and other darks in many layers of transparent color.
I’m happy with the results, but were I to do this over, I would pour the windows, sidewalk, and shadows and perhaps the dark bag and pants. Then I would paint the women directly.
Or purchase a print at Fine Art America.com. See more of my people paintings here: people art
Since becoming a painter of people, I’ve developed some sneaky ways of photographing strangers in public. One of them is to sit in a restaurant or on a park bench and pretend to be reviewing my pictures when I am actually taking pictures instead. I took the photos I used for this painting in just that way.
I just had to take the photos because of the way kitchen lights in the otherwise dark pub threw these waiters into relief. They looked like they were on stage, yet the scene was intimate. It reminded me of an Edward Hooper painting. But I’m no Hooper, and I intended something much warmer than the world he painted.
It wasn’t easy. I tried a version of this painting almost a year ago and was unsatisfied with it. As usual, the main problem was composition. I included too much of the scene and destroyed much of both the intimacy and the light contrast I was trying to present.
I like this new smaller version much better than last year’s version.
Once again I used a limited palate: phthalo blue, cobalt blue, burnt sienna, and raw sienna. Because I was painting with limited supplies in Colorado, I only had one yellow. If I had been painting at home I would have substituted a brighter yellow for the raw sienna.