I never set out to become a portrait painter, it just sort of happened…now I find myself painting as many portraits as Silhouettes






I never set out to become a portrait painter, it just sort of happened…now I find myself painting as many portraits as Silhouettes
I have always been an avid fan of the portrait painter Holbein the Younger. This portrait has been greatly inspired by his portrait of the young Princess Elizabeth. There is much to learn from the Old Masters.
Another umbrella painting from my Umbrella Series. Can’t get enough of blue and brown!
Close up detail from the painting shown in the previous post.
Today, as the late summer breeze filtered through my studio door I have been enjoying some more work on this young girl portrait. Still, a little way to go, but what an exciting painting this has been so far. For the first time, I have ventured into surrealism territory by adding a 3D floating piece of paper with my trademark silhouettes. I don’t know quite where I’ll end up with it, but here’s the result so far with a photograph of a corner of our Danish terrace garden.
A few months ago my art supplier stopped stocking my preferred Winsor & Newton oil paints. Whilst I was waiting for an online delivery of new colours I decided to mess around with a few acrylic paints I had kicking around the studio. For an oil painter to switch to acrylic painting there are many challenges. One of which is obvious – acrylics dry really fast! A real problem when working with layering glazes as I was doing with oils. The recent portraits posted here are acrylic paintings, the pressure is on to work a little faster to try to create an acrylic portrait using oil painting techniques! Here’s a recent acrylic portrait which I have tried to make appear as though it has been painted in oils.