Monhegan in September

The second annual Maine Landscape Guild trip to Monhegan took place during the first week of September this year. Six of us rented a house in the village, right on Fish Beach. In fact, the house is a converted fish house, and it's proximity to the water became all too evident on the second night when the remains of Hurricane Hannah roared through. We were fortunate the wind shifted when it did or we would have been IN the water, not just near it. Other than that dramatic night we had wonderful weather and we got a lot of painting done. This is a little (8 x 10 inches) painting of the tide coming in to the cove just north of the Kent House. 

A Slow Summer

It's been a slow and disjointed summer. This is the first year in about twenty years that I did not pack up and move to the shore for the whole summer. Unfortunately, that didn't mean I got to spend all of my time in the studio. I don't know where all of the time went. I did get some work done, however. This is a painting from a trip to Island Beach State Park. The morning fog was burning off and the path through the dunes was cool underfoot. There was a hint of September in the morning breeze.

Greg

Here is my attempt to paint a portrait despite not being able to see the sitter's eyes. There were so many problems with the photographs that were available to work from. The biggest problem, of course, was that he was wearing sunglasses in the photo. Also, the hat in the picture was bizarrely distorted by the flash. I was reluctant to just "take off the hat" because I had so little to work with to get a likeness that I was afraid I wouldn't be able to see the true shape of his head. I brought a baseball hat into the studio and lit it appropriately so I would have something to work from. I had to reduce the size of his hand because the camera had distorted that as well. When I started working on his eyes, I found the I needed someone to use as a model. I could tell from one of the other photographs that I'd been given, that he had deep set blue eyes. I started looking around for someone I could use as an eye model. I first used the eyes of Heath Ledger because it was easy to find a lot of pictures of him on line. That made this boy look too old. I painted them out and tried again, this time using my older daughter as the model. My older daughter has brilliant green eyes, but she is the same age, and it was simple to adjust the eye color. These eyes look more "believable" but it can't possibly look very much like the boy. I feel so bad for his parents. I've worked for weeks on this and I'm going to have to call it quits. I will offer to paint the sunglasses on for them if they would prefer that.

Hubris

I haven't disappeared. I haven't given up the blog. I simply went to the shore. I needed to take a break from the portrait I've been working on. What made me think I could pull this off? What kind of artistic hubris? How could I possibly get some kind of likeness without being able to see the boy's eyes? I will work on this some more, then call it complete, have it given to the parents with the promise that I will give them another, either with the sunglasses, or from another photograph. I have taken two things away from this struggle, however. First, I will spend some time contemplating the negative aspects of "pride", and I will take many more pictures of my kids.

A Challenge

I started another posthumous portrait for the Lost Dreams project. The family provided photos to work from, but I'm at a standstill. One photo was what looked to be an 8th grade graduation picture, blurry, with a sun-in-the-eyes squint. Another is an odd angle, from below. In the last, the young man is wearing opaquely dark sunglasses and a baseball hat. I decided to use the third, because it was the closest thing to a traditional portrait pose, and the placement of the hand might give him a thoughtful look. But the sunglasses are proving to be a terrible problem. I've been trying for days to glean enough information from the three photos to give me a sense of what he looks like. I'm going to leave the hat on his head because I can't see what his head is really shaped like and that is so basic to getting a likeness. I can tell his eyes are deep set and a beautiful gray blue, but I'm having an awful time getting them to look like they're set in his head properly and that they're the same eyes in the picture taken from below. It got me thinking again about how much these portraits must mean to a family who may only have a couple of poor quality snapshots as mementos. I will keep working on this. If anyone has any ideas about how I could do this, please let me know.

A Beautiful Day

Was it Toad or Ratty who said, "Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats." ? The only thing better is to spend the morning painting at a friend's farm, then taking a break to paddle about in a small boat. On Saturday, the art group I belong to got together to paint outside. The location was spectacular, and the company even better. Here are Alice Dustin and Renee Daily enjoying a Wind in the Willows moment.

I've never been comfortable painting en plein aire, but I brought my new camera and had a great time taking photographs. I expect to get several paintings out of the day's pictures.

Completion

I finished Darnell's portrait today. I decided to keep the background light because I liked the way the warm colors in his face glow in contrast to the lighter cooler background. I made a few drawing corrections which helped with the likeness as well as accentuating his youth.