A Painting A Day

[caption id="attachment_231" align="alignnone" width="259"] Dick van Dyke[/caption]

Okay, so I'm taking this art class at the Memphis College of Art, and our assignment was to mix colors and paint them randomly on a piece of paper. We had to mix at least two colors together and not repeat the colors. Then we were told to cut the paper up into small squares and glue them onto a canvas - creating a composition. Most of the students in the class made abstracts, but I love portraits, so couldn't resist doing one with my painted squares. It reminds me of Dick van Dyke wearing that straw hat in the Sound of Music. Ha! I guess it's good to think outside the "box."

Worked a little more on it today - with this I am trying to let go of preconceived notions and let the shadows imply lines. I was working on a really small canvas - an 8x6. I still need to work on darkening the mid tones. The contrast is too great between the dark and the light.

Just started this tonight. Not sure if I will take it a lot further. I like the abstractness of it. Great subject to work with, she was an amazing woman.

This is my effort from last nights painting from life. There are some glaring drawing mistakes here - the head is too small - the hands even though unfinished are too big - the arm on the left is too thin - etc etc. But I did what I could in two and a half hours and can't take a photo of the model because she is nude, so can't fix it when I get home. I think that's a good indication that I am not measuring enough (or at all!) in the beginning - so I must do better with that.

 There are some things I like about it though, in particular I think my flesh tone colors were better. I think I did a better job of sculpting the paint. I don't know how to describe it really - but what I mean is using the brush strokes to follow the contours of the body. She had a lot of reflected light and I tried to see it and capture it. It is a "study" after all, and so it's important to learn something each time I paint.