30 Faces, 30 days April 1-7, 2020

I’m trying to look at the positive of this COvid-19 induced self isolation. I’m trying to draw and paint more everyday since I was laid off 2 weeks ago. It’s easy to slip into a funk without the daily routine of work and extracurricular activities to keep me busy. I read somewhere busy is no longer an excuse for the lack of art making. Very true.

So there’s been a 30 faces, 30 day challenge floating around the interweb and I thought I’d throw my hat into the ring. I’m on a draw from life binge lately, and since self isolation has cancelled the sessions I had arranged with a few friends, you’ll be seeing your’s truly for the next month! PArt of my personal objective is not to be too precious with these drawings. Just bang them out… or at least that’s the plan.

Here are the first 7 self portraits.

April 1, 2020

April 2, 2020

April 3, 2020

April 4, 2020

April 5, 2020

April 6, 2020

April 7, 2020

A Self Portrait and Everything But the Kitchen Sink....

I finally finished my latest self portrait. It was a fun painting to work on and opened up some potential avenues I could explore in future paintings. It also allowed me to paint things in groups. A little unsettling at times but I have to remember that I’m allowed to make mistakes and every painting doesn’t have to be a “masterpiece”!

The final piece can be seen here.

Self Portrait time

I was aching to start a self portrait after painting the beer cans and now I have the time. I think with the covid-19 self isolation i’ll have the time to play around with this painting. The mantra for this portrait will be, “more is more”. So i’m going to load it up with a lot of non sensical objects. I will paint this portrait like it's a page out of my sketchbook.

Before and After...finally done

Typically, I’m dissatisfied with any paintings I finish, but these two, I’m OK with. Take a look at the individual pieces here and here.

I see the light…

I’m getting close to finishing this painting. Hopefully it'll be done by the end of the weekend. The lettering went quicker than the Heineken commission and i’m grateful for that. Now it's finessing the metalness of the can and getting the spacing of “bier” just right.

Slow progress

I’m a slow painter. This painting is evidence of that. It took me the entire night to paint these few letters. Got to speed up production.

Stiegl Beer Can, part 2

Starting the crumpled beer can painting. I’ve never painted creased metal so this will be a challenging image to paint.

Penciling in the can.

Blocking in the colour and calling it a night.

Progress

Getting some more done on this painting.

Terry

My friend generously posed for me over a period of 3 Mondays. The aim for this year is to paint more from life, especially people. It’s one thing painting from a picture and it’s an entirely different thing painting from life. I find the pose naturally shifts over a session and trying to get the overall features down before they move, sneeze, smile or any other minor shift, is a real challenge.

I also found this painting to be very finicky. That’s the other goal: to be more general with my portraits, broad strokes of colour. Ultimately, I want my portraits to transcend it being simply an exercise of portraying an accurate depiction of the sitter and be something greater than the sum of its parts.

Session 1

Session 2

Final session.

A New Beer Can…

I had a idea of painting this beer can, initially because of the bold type. Much simpler than my previous Heineken painting. However, the follow up painting to this one will be an image of the crumpled can. It'll make a nice pair.

WIP…pencil shavings

I’ve been sitting on this for a while trying to figure out if it needed pencil shavings in the image. Its painted in and I still need to work on them to mold them into a semblance of what they actually look like.

The Last of the Type…

Well all the major type elements are painted in and now it’s a waiting and staring game. Looking at what needs to be finagled and what can be omitted.

Sketchbook Dump

It’s nice to get back to some sketching. I realize I’m the type of artist who tends to have tunnel vision. When I’m painting, I’m painting. When I’m drawing in my sketchbook, I’m drawing. I need to find a balance this year.

Dad

Hand lettering and hair loss

I’m trained as a graphic designer, so every piece that involves typography, I have a desire for the type to be computer precise. I have two thoughts on this. 1.) Yes it should be, or at least be as close to computer generated type, and maybe if I stick with this mindset, eventially it can look more neater. 2.) It should ’t at all, and I have to execute the entire painting in a looser manner so that loosely painted type will fit in to the style of the painting.

This touches on the issue my painting “style”. Clearly I haven’t figured out how I want to paint paintings in a manner that satisfies both my tighter tendencies with a desire to be looser.

More Heineken

So refining, refining, refining the metal effect of the can. It's my first painting that involves a reflective, metal cylinder. A steep learning curve for me and not trying to paint every little detail I see in the reflection of the can. Squinting my eyes help with capturing the larger, differing tonal areas. Once I get the reflections to a satisfactory stage i’ll go back and work on the green and then the lettering ( my hairline will recede another half inch at that point).

Heineken commission

It’s been a slow start on this one. When I was asked to do this commission, I had no idea how elaborate the Heineken logo was. In my mind it was just a green can, with the “Heineken” word mark running vertically. HOw hard could that be? Well when I when to the beer store to buy a can the reality hit me. As you could tell I don’t drink that often so to see this logo threw me back a bit. So the difficulty of portraying this and a winter cold threw me off. Hopefully I’ll finish it in the next month. Fortunately my client is not in a big rush to get this, but it’d be nice to get it done and get paid for it.

Scrooge

Alistair Sim, THE best Scrooge portrayal ever.
Christmas sale.
8x10 inches.

oil on board

$350.00

SOLD

New home…

The varnished piece being sent to its new home.
Update: mailed it 5 days ago via express delivery, thinking that it would arrive the next day. Apparently its still in transit. Gotta love the Christmas rush.

Winter sale!

I’ve been working on these mini sumo portraits lately and they’re ready just in time for Christmas! Get one for the sumo lover in your family.

Here are the specs:

Black and white portraits are 8x10 inches, oil on board. The colour portrait is 8x12 inches and all of them are $350.00.

If you live in Toronto, I could deliver it to you in person. However, with out of town purchases, shipping and handling charges apply.

Merry festivus to you all.

SOLD.

Colour. Yay or nay?

I’ve been painting these smaller sumo portraits in the usual black and white colour scheme. However, I felt it needed a bit more so I added splashes of colour. I’m not feeling it, so I might just go back to the black and white. Any thoughts?