During our first lockdown in Italy, I strove to find a new spurt of creativity and was very productive from March to August 2020. My painting studio is within my home in Venice so with a fixed 200 metre limit to venture from home, meaning outdoor painting was impossible, I stayed focused on artwork. I even surprised myself at how much energy and creativity I had. I realized how important creativity is for mental health.
Understanding that a second virus wave would take place, I sought something completely new for the next lockdown phase. I decided to try portraiture for the first time. Obviously having live models in the studio was out of the question so I worked from selected good photos and soon had enough requests to keep painting. I've never been to art school so learning a new discipline, using the difficult medium of watercolour, was a challenge. A good light drawing was essential initially to get all the proportions of the face correct. Learning how light affects skin tones was a battle, but again I made progress painting almost with dry pigment, scumbling the surface to meld colours. I later chose more unusual headshots to improve the overall composition of the portrait and abandoned initial drawing to paint directly on paper.
I started off painting rather naive representations of faces, slowly capturing likeness, and later emotions. Six months later I became more consistent in representing each personality, and I'm pleased to share a few of the many portraits I've made during this period.
Understanding that a second virus wave would take place, I sought something completely new for the next lockdown phase. I decided to try portraiture for the first time. Obviously having live models in the studio was out of the question so I worked from selected good photos and soon had enough requests to keep painting. I've never been to art school so learning a new discipline, using the difficult medium of watercolour, was a challenge. A good light drawing was essential initially to get all the proportions of the face correct. Learning how light affects skin tones was a battle, but again I made progress painting almost with dry pigment, scumbling the surface to meld colours. I later chose more unusual headshots to improve the overall composition of the portrait and abandoned initial drawing to paint directly on paper.
I started off painting rather naive representations of faces, slowly capturing likeness, and later emotions. Six months later I became more consistent in representing each personality, and I'm pleased to share a few of the many portraits I've made during this period.
Peter
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Bravo PD...
ReplyDeleteLoved it!
ReplyDeleteAmazing work
ReplyDeleteNever knew you’re an artist
Really lovely portraits. Lucky subjects!
ReplyDelete