At my wife’s urging I embarked on Luciana’s Portrait. Luciana is my granddaughter and the subject of oodles of photographs. Agreeing to the portrait was the easy part; more challenging was developing the nerve to begin. My existing body of work includes only two examples of human faces. My first, titled “Sleepy Kids” includes my youngest daughter and our chocolate and tan dapple dachshunds asleep on the couch in repose. Devin, the title of my second attempt, captures a family friend lost in though at work. I feel both paintings were successful and developmental. So armed with a reference photograph, a linen canvas and my aging collection of oils I started to work.
I work from my own photography in my studio or that of my mentor Karl Kuerner. I started Luciana’s portrait in Karl’s studio from the reference photo below. I don’t spend a great deal of time planning my work or pallet. I don’t do value studies and I rarely create exploratory studies of my subjects. I work more spontaneously or emotionally in the moment.
During my first session I blocked out major sections of the portrait on my canvas. The head, hands and blanket are the primary compositional elements laid down on a simplified background. I left Karl’s studio thrilled with my progress.
Walter Thomas Lee 