Donna Granata visited the studio yesterday to shoot the portrait photos for the Focus on the Masters archive that I mentioned a couple of days ago. I enjoyed her company very much, she’s great fun to chat with. I’m looking forward to seeing what the pictures look like; she’s going to show the portrait in [...]
The quest for foliage continues, and I’ve been adding dark shadows into the foliage on the right side of the painting, building substance and getting further away from the very decorative leaves that were there before. In the photo you can see where the new edge of the painting is (regular visitors will remember I [...]
This was the most nerve-racking but fastest photo shoot I’ve done so far, but I think we laughed more than most of the other shoots too. It was very straightforward in essence, just one model (Aaron again, except he’s lost twenty pounds and looks completely different compared to when he posed for the Emperor in [...]
I’m letting the Empire painting rest for a little while so I can look at the piece again with a fresh eye in a couple of weeks, so I’ve moved to the old Empress painting. I’ve had this piece [...]
The morning glory has spread to cover much of the calf of the Emperor’s right leg, but I want to show more of it reaching up to pass his left foot, perhaps even stretching out tendrils toward his abdomen and increasing the feeling that he is being overwhelmed by the creeping vines. Working on the [...]
There’s nothing like building upon the foundations built by giants to make certain that your own work is of better quality. At the Getty we visited some of my favorite paintings (Alma-Tadema’s “Spring”, a lovely Sargent portrait, a pair of Tissot society ladies and one of Godward’s best pieces, “Mischief and Repose”). But I was [...]
I’ve been getting pre-occupied with the composition of the Empress, which bothers me in reductions of the painting. I’m planning to add several more figures around the existing girls, and to paint more detail in the figures, who are too simple at the moment. So today I borrowed my neighbors daughter and shot photos of [...]
I had the pleasure of hosting a studio talk at my space at CLU yesterday afternoon, including a brief demonstration of glaze painting, using a Sap Green over the background of the Star to show the luminosity and flexibility of oil painting. Between twenty and thirty people attended, and we had a very pleasant [...]
After continuing the patchy Raw Umber brown a little further by using a rag to lift leaf shapes from the paint, revealing the orange glow of the Iron Oxide ground, I’ve expanded the range of the star shaped jasmine flowers to create an S shaped swoop down behind the figure. This done I spent a [...]
I’m very pleased to be able to share these four images with you. They’re the result of a year and a half of painting. The Angel of Death, The Magician, The Empress, The Traveler. All Oil on Canvas, 96″ x 96″. Copyright Michael Pearce 2011
