January series...complete!

Well...my January 2016 series has come to a close...kind of.  I may keep making some portraits, maybe not every day...but I have in my mind a number that I would like to complete- and maybe show.  But first, some reflections on this body of work.

RENDERING: One goal was to get back to working with pencil and drawing a little more realistically since I tend to favor a more stylized style when working with the face.  And I did. Some of the pieces came out better than others, and I still want to push my darks so that is something that I will continue to work on.  Overall, I feel like my style has a light touch, and I think I am okay with that but I know that including darker values will create a richer image with more depth.   I intentionally left some of my 'underdrawing' visible...I think it shows the process of how the face came to appear from a blank white page, which is the most magical part to me of drawing and painting.

QUOTES: I also wanted to work with quotes in this series.  When I first started I would pair a random face I created with a quote that I liked.  But a few pieces into the series I realized that I wanted to take it a step further and pair the quote with an actual portrait of the person who said the quote (or in some cases is associated with the quote)  This also made the series a little more challenging because rather than just draw out of my head, I was working from photo references with the goal of creating a likeness of that person.  

MIXED-MEDIA: I added the watercolor washes to each piece to contrast with the gray scale of the rendering, and to make the faces stand out more.  The watercolor features wet on wet, salt technique, spattering and paint drips to contrast with the tightness of the rendering.

SUBJECT SELECTION:  I selected women (mostly) that I admire for one reason or another.  Many are relevant to music, there are some authors, artists, icons of fashion and popular culture humanitarianism.  And yes, you're eyes aren't playing tricks on you- there ARE some men featured in the photo below.  I chose to draw David Bowie when he passed to honor him, and his androgonous spirit that was not bound by male or female identitiy.  (Then I did another portrait of him just because...not in the daily count...I wanted to remember him in one of my favorite roles, as Jereth the Goblin King in Labyrinth)  I also included another piece I did not in the series, but in the same style- a portrait of Ric Flair and his daughter Charlotte that I gave to him in Miami. Also, not pictured, I am currently finishing up a commissioned piece for my cheer judge friend- Kent.
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​PURCHASE AND COMMISSION INFO:  Yep, these are for sale- all of them (except for  the piece from January 4th, the two David Bowie pieces,the  Jackie O portrait and the Ric Flair Portrait...if your favorite original sold I am willing to recreate something similar, but not quite identical)  I will be scanning some or all of these pieces to be available for purchase as prints and on gift items.  I will create a blog post and social media campaign when get those images up.  Also, I have had some inquiries about the originals, each original is prices at $120, which includes a white mat with protective plastic sleeve and shipping.  

If you are interested in commissioning me to create a portrait for you- custom images in this same style start at $150 and go up from there for larger images- additional faces in a portrait are $25 extra per face.  For more information, you can email me directly at [email protected].

Thanks everyone for all the support while creating this series. It was definitely a tougher one for me to complete artistically, but it also awakened my deep love for drawing so I look forward to trying to complete that magical number of portraits I have set for myself...I hope to reveal that later this spring.

In the meantime...my new series for February...I think I may head back to the land of big-eyed ladies...maybe they'll have wings...