Friday, March 12, 2010

Oil Portrait of a Girl with a Towel

"The Scent of the Summer Breeze" (36"X24", Oil on Canvas, SOLD)

I did this as a commission for someone who lives nearby the North End, in one of the high-rise apartment towers along the water. He had very specific ideas of what he wanted to see in his painting, so my hands were tied to a certain extent. I don't have any problem with doing what someone else wants in a painting, and especially if there's some figure painting involved. The human form is infinitely interesting to me, so I was happy to do a nude that didn't include any "front stuff", as he called it. I was also happy to include a towel, since I really enjoy painting folds in fabric.
He wanted something "sensual", so I decided to see how many of the senses I could include. I got the scent of the rose, the texture of the towel and the feeling of the breeze by the window, the sound of the rustling curtains, and of course the sight of the pretty girl lost in thought. I couldn't get any flavors into the painting without putting a cup of coffee or some food in there, but I felt that would be too much. I guess the judgement call I made could be construed as a matter of "taste", but that's as far as I'll go.

Seated Nude Woman

"Oil Sketch of Seated Nude, Looking Left" (16"X20", Oil on Canvas, $250)

This was done in the same class that produced most of the other figure paintings on this blog. I like the loose approach to the brushwork and the way the gesture of her pose comes through in the painting. She was a good model, but like so many others, she posed for two sessions and was never seen again. I think most artist's models are students who move on to something more steady and lucrative after a year or two.
You can see that in this painting the lit shoulder is further from the viewer, which makes the process a little more difficult and isn't the standard way of doing things to produce depth in a painting. Luckily, this one-session sketch was left as it is, and I moved along to a second version that zooms back to include more of the figure and chair for the second session. The other one is pretty good, but this one os better.