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Happy at 3
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Message
Posted
Superb drawing, and the colour study - not so much the fingers as yet: tricky fellers, fingers - is a work in its own right. You could go almost any way you choose with the background, and I wouldn't want to hint at a choice one way or the other, because it's quite obvious that you know what you're doing. Just be sure to finish the painting before your daughter hits her 20th birthday.....
Posted
Thanks Robert. Yes, I'd kind of achieved what I wanted to by the time I got to the fingers in the colour study so was a little lazy there. I'm not a fan of fingers and my daughter's little ones bend a bit oddly which makes it even harder to look right. I'd originally wanted to do a rainbow background to represent her personality more (with unicorns and sparkles!) but it didn't work at all - was way too distracting so I think I'm going for a more traditional one.
I appreciate your faith in me knowing what I'm doing — I know I'm getting better over time but still feel like I've got a lot of developing to do (which I think is how I should feel. If I could get what was in my head on canvas perfectly I'd probably stop painting!)
I'm hoping to finish it in a month but that probably means another two years :-)
Posted
Well done, Gary et al. I've taken an online course in drawing (Charles Bargue style) a short face to face course on drawing and am now contemplating a longer f2f course at City Lit. But I don't actually like drawing. I find it a struggle. I feel exhausted when it's done, leaving no energy to paint the image. I look at some sketches from you good folks on here and wonder how?
Posted
Thanks Norrette. I. can understand not liking drawing (some of it is tedious and dull, but I also find mixing colours a bit tedious). For me though, drawing is a big part of things and it's mainly about accurate measuring. When I am doing a painting I tend to do just enough drawing for the painting (so outlines and shadow shapes) if that makes sense? I learnt a lot from some artists on Patreon (I love you only pay monthly so can plough through the material and then end the subscription - some artists also do critiques there) and a couple of other online courses (I'm not sure if I am allowed to mention them here?). In a way I think when your painting you are still drawing - creating the shapes you need (just with brushes). To be honest I feel exhausted at the end of any art session but I also never paint on the same day as the drawing as I know there will be things I never noticed and need to correct the next day before painting (it's awful to do a painting I'm really pleased with to find the one eye looks like it's floating upwards!)
Shading in graphite takes a long time but I find it really mindful if I'm in the mood. OK I seem to have wittered on a lot there (without saying much!).
Here's the second colour layer finished. One more layer to tighten up the facial features and decide what to do with the background...I'm having a day off to recover and refresh tomorrow while it dries.
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