A Painting A Day

This isn't a good picture. I took this late at night and couldn't get rid of the glare. Also there's a lot more red in this painting than is showing up in the photo. I will take another picture when I'm finished with it. I wasn't satisfied to just do an abstract today - I've been wanting to paint this one, so I got a good start on it. I really love the creepiness of these American Horror story paintings. They are fun to do!

It's icy and schools were closed today. So I had a little time this afternoon to start a painting. I didn't do a lot on the hands - but I'm really liking the abstractness of them. I have to say I find Jessica Lange fascinating to paint. She has such amazing features. Even now, at her age, she's still a very beautiful woman.

My friend's son modeled for our Live Paint group last night, and he had recently died his pretty blonde hair purple! So the hair color was really that color! Haha. This makes the third time I've painted him - more recently he is the boy in my Brother and Sister post. On his features, looking at it now, I feel like I may have exaggerated a bit - his nose a little too long, his lips a little too full, the neck a little too long as well. I may go back and work on it a little more over the weekend. Happy Thursday!

Did this last night. I used payne's grey for the background. I really like doing that. It makes the piece very dramatic. I used a lot of permanent green light. It just seemed the right base color to use for the light around the eyes, and for the medium highlights in the hair. If you really, really look at her hair it has a very greenish tint to me. I believe I've been finding this to be true of all the blondes I have painted.

This is on a 12 x 16 board. I am trying to get enough work together for my very first exhibit! So excited about that, but I wonder if I can part with a single piece. I don't know if I can. I want to "exhibit" but not necessarily "sell." I read somewhere that successful artists don't need to be collectors of their own work. That makes a lot of sense, but putting it into practice is hard.

So why have I titled this, "The New Religion?" I think for this show, my theme is going to be how we idolize movie and television stars. They are the new religion. I'm not condoning it, by any means, it's just a sad fact. Our new idols are the people we watch on TV.

Today I'm working on a piece of the character Tate in American Horror Story, and I've positioned him like a saint. Haha! I wonder how this will go over, since the exhibit is in a church?!

It's late at night and there's a terrible glare from my camera, but I went back to this portrait tonight and did a little more detail. The painting had dried a little so I was able to work with it.

I am still not quite happy with it. I am missing something - and can't figure out what it is? Maybe sleep?

I couldn't find a photo to work from at class this week, so Sue (my teacher) gave me a clipping of a painting by Casey Baugh. Great artist! Wow, so glad she told me about him.

My paint was way too oily so I had a difficult time getting the paint to do what I wanted it to do.

I'm planning on going back and working a little more on it after it dries somewhat. ;)