Thursday, October 16, 2008

THE LAST DEMO: A CHILD


When I was in French class in high school, Stephanie Alexander (now Hamil) sat behind me. Stephanie is very tall and could look over my shoulder. She had her book open and would tell me when I had misspelled a word or made a mistake (unsolicited advice) Now we are grandmothers!!! What's up with that? This is her adorable grandbaby. I used this photo as my inspiration for the last demo in the workshop which was about infants and small children. I haven't had the time to fine tune this little painting. I need to soften the chin and warm up the backside area. Next time I will use manganese or cerulean blue instead of Thalo for the initial drawing. The lines stayed a little too strong. This is on traditional 140lb Arches paper with traditional watercolors. I drew the image with my #4 lizard's lick brush from Cheap Joe's.

I think everyone was especially into this subject matter. You can see their love for the subject in the finished paintings. Keep in mind everyone drew their images freehand (no tracing allowed) and then did the painting in a few hours. Pretty impressive! Below is the final slide show of this workshop with the group photo included. I look forward to returning again sometime in the future.

Saturday I fly off to Portland, spend the night and have a great visit with another life-long friend, and then a drive to Ocean Shores, Washington on Sunday for next week's workshop. I am looking forward to a change of scene and being right on the Pacific Coast and meeting some great new people. It is really fun meeting people who have become friends through the internet and blog world. I will be traveling with my computer, so I will try and share as we go.

3 comments:

Amy Gethins Sullivan said...

Your baby portrait looks lovely~ they all turned out well~
And you can see the affection for the little subjects.
It seems that all I paint anymore are children~ I love painting & drawing them~
I haven't painted an adult in such a long time & i just got a commission for a portrait of two grandparents w/ their grandchild~
~Amy~

Anonymous said...

thanks as always for your inspiration, that grandchild made me want to do a portraiture rather than florals, and your pics of mike's studio made me realize how much I am missing out there by not painting for a long time, so you have helped me make some decisions!! first I am going to santa cruz tomorrow, even with the cataract patch on my eye!! and second, I am going to have to make some priorities and slash these volunteer jobs that seem to be a full time. thanks again for your humorous and inspiring website. have a great time.

Myrna Wacknov said...

Congratulations, Amy, on your commission. The difficult part of multiple people in one portrait is to keep them all in proportion to one another.

Related Posts with Thumbnails