Let's Hear it for the Boys

Painters love to paint and every week I am thrilled just to have a model to paint. Our models are all ages, shapes and sizes -which we love; however, most of our models are ladies. In the last few weeks we have had the luck of being able to paint young men, a change and challenge that we all enjoyed.

 One of our college-age female models brought her friend Colin to a studio session. Young and handsome, costumed in a renaissance shirt, he was straight out of an Austen novel, I loved it. We painted outside that day and I used a small canvas to capture his image (unfinished). I was happy with the results which I felt captured his features (I am really focusing on  feature likenesses lately). I hope that we book him for another session.

For Colin the sun was up and to the viewer's right. I need more contrast in the light and shadow, so will have to lighten the sunny side. Also Colin's eyes are narrowed because the sun was bright. I really just want to go back in and add more contrast, other than that the feature sizes and placements are fairly accurate.

Today our model did not show up (this happens sometimes). Luckily, a fellow artist had her grandson in town. At sixteen he still has a young sweet face with full cheeks (he would dislike that description but it's true). He was a great model, and again I thought I captured him. In real life he looked younger and somehow I made him a little more grown up, but even his Grandmother said that I got his likeness--Yes!

Look at all that hair, reminds me of a retro style --all long on top and shaggy on bottom. His eyes are light and bright and the light was hitting his face beautifully. I just want to say "Ahhh youth."

I've always worried about painting men and have thought about how to get their head proportions down correctly. I feel that my Figure Drawing classes and Portrait Workshops have really helped me to "See" so that I can get the correct widths and features down.

A Study of the Face

I See Tris in You

Only once the painting was complete did I see the resemblance to Tris of Insurgent. In reality our model is the same age and has similar coloring;however, I believe the bright light led to the parallels to Tris.

I am very happy with this painting as I have been studying portrait drawing and features. I do not want to create generic faces or features. An artist mentor recently said that eyebrows and asymmetry ("the little things") do make a difference. That thought was in my mind as I studied our model's eyebrows, curve of nose and corner of mouth.

Intentionally, I chose a smaller canvas (9x12) so that I would not be distracted by extraneous information. My model time is limited to a few hours and I really had to focus.

The model's hair is tied up and goes off the top of the canvas, the front pieces reflected the blue light brilliantly. Dark brown hair was being hit with direct light and it glowed almost white the way the light hit.

"What can I leave out?" I've learned is a question that is as important as "what do I put in?" Here I only imply the eyes as all I could see was the dark downcast lashes - no eyeball, no whites of eyes. Still, the viewer knows the eyes are downcast...

I have also been working on jawline. The darkness under the chin and the curve up toward the ear are important and width and curve matter. I feel that I captured the size and width accurately.

Note the light hitting the top of eyebrow, the eyelid, the nose, the lower lip and the chin. Such bright blueish light on the face meant that the shadow side was warm and deep. Much of her right cheek (facing her) is in shadow as is her top lip and part of chin.

I have captured something here and am pleased with the outcome of this face study.