I’ll be showing many self portraits and portraits of artists at the next show at Marseille Project Gallery, among them this life size self portrait from 2000.

Life Size self-portrait 2000 Acrylic on canvas

The show is called Artists Portraits and it’s on the 24th of April 2010 at 17:00 at the Marseille Project Gallery, directions here.

Having finished the portrait of my wife, Lira Kay, I thought I would write about the second part of the portrait process, the creation of the painted portrait.

We started out in Part I: the drawings.  And here are the various stages of this portrait.  In total, it was 6 sittings, 5 of which are shown.

State 1

Lira Kay: state 1

I find it disturbing to see portraits that are started and stopped in one session.  The idea of getting it absolutely right so quickly seems to show two things: that there is an ‘absolutely right’ and that it would be so easy to find.  I think the portrait process is a journey, and my journeys involve all sorts of turns and fumbles and questions.

State 1 here is an example of that.  The skin tone has little to do with the hair tone here, which in turn has little to do with the background.  The heaviness of the skin tone sheds light on the importance I place on the face. Read the rest of this entry »

Thanks to all who came to the exhibition! For those who didn’t make it. Here are the photos…

Thanks to those of you who have asked for a little background to how the portraits come to be.

Creating a portrait takes a serious commitment from myself and the sitter.  The portrait of my dad took about 10 sittings for the drawings and another 10 or 15 for the painting.

I am currently working on two portraits, one of my wife and another of my children.  In this post, I’ll show you the drawings of my wife that led up to the portrait. In a later post, I’ll take you through the painting stages…

So, here’s the first drawing.

Drawing Number 1

The first drawing is where I start with knowing.  I know what I want and I just draw it exactly as I want.  In this case, I want a big head and I want to reflect the loving and youthful character of my wife.

Why the big head? I think there is a certain ratio I like to have between the size of the head and the canvas. Also, big heads signify affection, as any child psychologist will tell you.

Read the rest of this entry »

You’re hereby invited to the latest exhibition Half hour from Paradise at the Marseille Project Gallery.

The exhibition centers on the idea of Place and also the idea of the present moment versus the future or the past.

Here’s the exhibition page at Marseille Gallery in English and French.