Self-Portrait Oil Sketch

"Self-Portrait Oil Sketch, July 2010" (Oil on Canvas, 16"X12", $350)

I did this oil sketch recently and hung it in a coffee house show that I'm doing so that the people there would have an idea of what the painter of all the pictures looks like.

I'm pretty happy with the likeness, as I wanted it to look like I was peering out at the viewer to see what he or she looked like, too. I was also a little pressed for time, as the show was approaching and I knew it would have to dry before I could transport it.

Doing self-portraits is tougher than it seems at first. Even though the model is always available and costs nothing to work with, it doesn't make it any easier to look at the same face so intently for a long period of time. There does come a tipping point, though, where you're no longer looking at yourself and trying to make yourself look good. You start seeing the abstract shapes that make up the planes of your own face and it gets kind of spooky. It's also difficult to keep your posture the same over a long time, so that you see yourself in the mirror from the same angle consistently. The final surprise comes when you realize that by looking at yourself in a mirror, you're actually reversing all the little asymmetries that make you look particularly like yourself. The only way to check it is to turn the painting around and look at the reflection of the picture in the mirror. Unfortunately, you can't look at your face and the painting side-by-side in the mirror because the same asymmetry-reversal principle takes over. Eventually you just say "enough!" and decide to be satisfied with the picture or not. I'm sure I'll try again someday.