When I saw a photo of this guy, I loved his funny rooster-tail man bun and made him my next portrait victim. I decided he was Hawaiian, gave him a tan and put him in a happy beach scene (see below for the process). It was fun to try to create the effect of bright sun on his shirts.
Original reference photo from Pinterest
(Left) Combined reference photo; (Right) first layer of oil paint
Above on the left is a composite I assembled in Photoshop for the reference photo. I can’t remember if I found the beach scene on Google or used Photoshop’s AI Generator to create it because I tried so many different things.
Freckles Minus Freckles, oil on gessoed Arches Oil paper, Zorn palette, 9×7”
Her nose! That interesting shape is why I wanted to paint her when I saw her photo (see below) on Pinterest. In the photo she is speckled with freckles but I was only interested in getting that nose!
Painting at 2 hours ( + 5 minutes to mess things up).
My intention had been to paint this in one session but I started too late in the day. I could have left it as it was at the the two-hour mark, but instead of walking away and getting dinner, I stupidly decided to just touch up one thing (which was unsuccessful of course because I was exhausted) so I had to basically touch up everything.
Inspiration photo from Pinterest; no photographer credit provided
Justin Timberlake After DUI Bust, Zorn palette, oil on paper, 11×7’
There was something so poignant about the news photo of Justin Timberlake after his bust for Driving While Intoxicated and I wanted to capture it in paint. Then something hilarious happened when I was preparing the photo of the painting for posting.
I clicked on the ℹ️ symbol in Apple Photos to make sure the picture I was selecting was the correct version for posting. I noticed a little white dot appeared in the middle of the photo. When I clicked on the dot, Apple AI/Siri told me that this was a painting of Robert Fergusson painted by 1700s Scottish painter, Alexander Runciman. WTF?
Isra Hirsi, daughter of Ilhan Omar, oil on paper, 8×7.5”
I was so struck by the photo (see below) of Isra Hirsi, the daughter of Representative Ilhan Omar, when I saw it in the New York Times. She was being interviewed after she was arrested for participating in a pro-Palestinian protest at her university. The look on her face seemed to say so much.
First sketch, 10×8”
After I sketched her (above) I had a dilemma. I loved the sketch but could see that I had gotten the dimensions very wrong. So do I paint from my sketch or try again to get the correct likeness? I decided to do another sketch, get it right and then do the painting.
As usual I got about halfway through the 12×9” painting, wasn’t happy with it and abandoned it, choosing to start over. I went for a smaller format since I was working from a screenshot of a tiny photo and was relatively happy with the results.
I used the Zorn palette to simplify things, but added a few other colors for her shirt.
My social media feeds kept showing me wigs (how do they know my formerly boisterously curly hair was getting thin, grey and wimpy?) The influencers looked so cute in their (probably very expensive) wigs that I decided to try one.
A dog park acquaintance who always wears a wig recommended I order one from Temu. It was cheap, hideous, huge, hanging over my eyes and shedding. It quickly went back to Temu, a store I’m not a fan of.
Then a friend pointed me to some higher-quality inexpensive wigs on Amazon. I bought the one I’m wearing in the picture because it reminded me of what my hair looked like in my 20s: long, thick, wavy, chestnut color.
Unfortunately, not being anywhere close to my 20s anymore, I looked ridiculous in it close up. But it was fun to take a selfie wearing it and then paint a self-portrait before returning the wig.
About Painting: I recently watched an online painting video with Carol Peebles. Her guidance about comparative measuring in portrait drawing clarified so many things I’d been confused about. It helped me to get a likeness with much less struggling.
Painting is so much more fun when starting with a good drawing! I’m really happy with how this turned out. I think it’s my favorite self-portrait ever and I’ve done at least 50 of them over the years.
This calf was in a photo on my Vermont friend Ruth’s Strava page and I thought it was so cute I took a break from the people portraits I’ve been working on to do a quick oil sketch of it.
Ruth told me about the photo: “It’s the dairy farm next door. Run by Sebastian Von Trapp, who is the great grandson of Captain Von Trapp. Sebastian’s grandfather was one of the Von Trapp singers!”
Portrait of Fiona’s Friend with the Mona Lisa Smile, oil 10×8”
I’m finally back to painting and drawing again after a very long break. For nearly a year I had illustrated my dreams and the daily Wordle and had posted about half of them. Then I burned out.
For the first time in my life I went for months without drawing or painting and for the first time since I started my blog in 2006, I stopped posting to0. I was afraid my passion for painting was gone for good and wondered who I would be without it.
Finally my desire to paint and draw came back (hooray!!!) BUT I was so rusty! Before the burnout I was able to quickly sketch a decent likeness. That was gone (as you can see in some of the failed attempts below!)
Some of the preliminary sketch starts (that didn’t end up in the trash)
It took more than seven sketch-starts before I kind of remembered how I draw (above).
Final painting and 2 of the failed painting starts
Then it took 5 painting starts before I felt I had a good enough beginning structure to keep going and complete the portrait.
My goal was to capture her Mona Lisa-like smile and I wouldn’t stop until I did.
Sadie and the 2021 Swim Trophy, watercolor, 10”x7.5”
My granddaughter Sadie loves to swim (and play soccer, basketball and read books, too). At the end of the season, after winning many races and awards, to fundraise for her team she swims lap after lap and people pledge $ per lap.
Reference photo
Trying to paint Sadie from this photo led to me giving up on oils and going back to watercolor. As was my way with oils, I tried repeatedly, persistently (obsessively?) but couldn’t make it work. This watercolor isn’t perfect, but it captures the joy of the moment and that makes me happy.
With watercolor I’m able to paint to a certain point and then happily call it done. Watercolor doesn’t allow you to keep fiddling forever like oil does.
Final drawing for the painting (after many corrections)
I again used a limited palette because it’s fun to see what I can do with only 3 colors. This time it was DS Hansa Yellow Medium, WN Permanent Alizarin and WN Cobalt Blue.
Test of Limited Palette Primary Triad using DS Hansa Yellow Medium, WN Cobalt Blue and Alizarin Permanent
I used to think it was really weird that artists limited their palettes. I thought one needed every possible color in order to capture color exactly. But now I prefer the harmony a limited palette provides and don’t really care about capturing exactly the colors in real life. I’m not trying to be a photocopier.
Green Peppers and Green Lemon, oil on Arches Oil Paper, 10×8”
In quarantine I started getting groceries delivered instead of risking going into stores. So when I ordered red peppers and received green ones, which I hate, I decided to paint them instead.
Setup and beginning of still life painting of green peppers
I was feeling anxious and exhausted and afraid I’d just make something ugly if I tried to paint so I gave myself permission to just go make an ugly painting. I even intentionally made it uglier by shining a warm light on the still life, which muddied the bright greens and yellows.
This commissioned portrait of a darling little girl was really fun to paint but had some challenges, like trying to invent the pajamas hidden by the highchair straps. It took several drawings (including one of a baby skull I found on Google) before I was ready to move ahead with the painting as you can see in the process steps below.
Emi’s face was actually easier to paint than the pajamas, and I was tempted to keep working on them, probably forever, but the friend who commissioned the painting was happy with it as is, so I am too.
Below is some of the work in progress steps. Please note that the lighting changed the colors in some of the photos.
Jana Bouc, Artist 