Exercise 1 View from a window or doorway

It's easy to find many images online views looking out of windows. Many artists over the years must have been inspired by these views which, if it is a view seen everyday can easily be taken for granted. All of them seem to convey to me a sense of contemplation and solitude. There are adequate views from my own house to choose from but all seemed to have their drawbacks but find it hard to be enthused. I had t o start somewhere, so did a few small sketches and a colour sketch of slightly differing views from kitchen window, dining room - of conifers and finally, from the lounge. A charcoal sketch of this view worked out more to my liking, so went ahead with this. A colour study and a painting later, I feel generally pleased with how things have turned out.

charcoal sketch

A view onto garden from lounge. This has the edge over the other views I think. The elements seem to balance better and there is a line leading the eye into the distant dark shadows behind the white garden pillar. The perspective of the hedge promotes a sense of recession.
Acrylics - on a ground of ultramarine and red mix.
During process I sprayed the canvas surface frequently when needed more time to blend the paint, it worked well.
I discovered that by using a dry brush with the paint on the background trees was very effective with the darks. After applying basic mid tone using repeated layers of paint (not just glazes) the paint kept on sinking into the canvas, virtually drinking it up, despite having three layers of gesso - albeit homemade from emulsion paint and pva. Whereas on paper I've found that the sinking reaction doesn't occur as long as one or two coats are applied first.
The time of day was around late afternoon. The sky looks a bit turbulent with a strange light as though just before a storm - it wasn't but that's how it turned out. As it happened it was a false alarm. I think this appearance is due to the fuzzy edges, especially in the garden, sky and the reflection on the windowsill.

Paul Nash Pink Hyacinth http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/pink-hyacinth-30020
I admire the way he has depicted the vase of flowers on the windowsill, my attention is drawn to this, hence the reason for the title.  It looks to have been done with just a few quick casual lines, asymmetrical, off balance and quirky. Alternating thick black contours balance it up well. It is quite simple looking and has a
very limited palette of muted colours - warm oranges and pinks with just a touch of green.

As a fauvist painter Raoul Dufy's main interests were saturated colour and decorative design. This is certainly evident in his painting 'Interior with Open Windows', where both the interior and exterior seem to have equal prominence. These kind of scenes actually became his hallmark and he was criticized for his paintings lacking substance, yet they were also a reflection of his optimistic personality. They depicted a sunny side of life, inviting luxurious interiors often looking out onto luxurious resort/locations, such as the French Riviera.http://uploads7.wikipaintings.org/images/raoul-dufy/open-window-1928.jpg!Large.jpg

In contrast, Edward Hopper had a spare manner of painting. He depicted realistic scenes of urban life, containing isolated figures and highly contrasting light and shadow. There is almost always a certain sense of isolation about at least one of them even when two of the characters appear to be in conversation with one another, as in 'Nighthawks'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nighthawks_by_Edward_Hopper_1942.jpg
His viewpoints were often unusual and exude a sense of of mystery and loneliness. Some of the people in his paintings could easily have been on the margins of society in some way.

I noticed that 'Corner of the Artist's Room' by Gwen John, painted during her affair in Paris with Auguste Rodinis, is displayed in several colour schemes on various websites. This one particularly appeals to me, a quiet, almost monochromatic scheme. It seems to be shrouded in a veil of mist, giving a feeling of mysterious isolation, the same time it looks inviting and restful.
https://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/whatson/?event_id=3648

colour study

completed painting

Assignment 3 Self Portrait

Arrangements in portraits are many and varied. They can range from a full figure, or a number of figures, to an extreme close up portion of a face. Described below are several that have helped to give me some inspiration for a self portrait and (hopefully) others in the future: 

Lucien Freud – Self portrait – Reflection with two children 1965. He must have painted this one from a high viewpoint with the mirror very low or even on the floor. He has portrayed himself as a huge domineering figure in relation to his own two tiny children at the bottom left; from this angle his domineering presence is further accentuated. The impression is one of him looking down at them while simultaneously looking at his own reflection in the huge mirror, perhaps a little anxiously. The two lamps, one above his shoulder and the other behind, give a sense that they are high above on the ceiling, contributing to the sense of scale. The colours, in muted, tones tend to add an air of brooding calmness.

http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/lucian-freud/reflection-with-two-children-self-portrait-1965

Freud - Man's Head - self portrait 1963. This is like a halfway house between his early and mature style. Thick buttery paint applied, without the gritty texture of later on. The paint - sensuous and smoothly flowing,  seeming to repeatedly encircle the face and background creating the impression of  turbulence . This negative space is carefully delineated against the face and neck making it more pronounced. Though the background contains mostly the midtones and colours used on the head and neck it has a life of its own. The whole thing has very tactile quality. Painting one's own face from this angle, with eyes looking downward from above, almost inevitably causes one to look a little arrogant, as I have discovered with my own self portrait in this assignment, yet the expression here also looks tired and slightly drawn.
http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/lucian-freud/man-s-head-self-portrait-1963

William Orpen - Self Portrait, Multiple Mirrors 1924.  There is a series of his self portraits displayed on the following linked web page, which were completed at different stages in his career. This particular one is situated roughly half way down the page: 
http://www.articlesandtexticles.co.uk/2006/06/26/painters-i-should-have-known-about-6-william-orpen-part-1/
Orpen's reflection recedes within multiple repetitions of the same mirror, until it almost disappears into the distant skyline, outside the open window behind. He was fond of using all sorts of tricks to created optical illusions in mind bending ways. 
The brushwork appears to have been applied quickly with some transparent washes in the lower half. I think the paint has been applied thickly on the main foreground face. At the same  time it has a certain luminosity. More attention seems to be drawn to this area because of the relatively large amount of detail and the pinky tones, contrasting with the green top.The sky in the background gives a feeling of airiness and space.

A Self Portrait

Thinking back to the early stages of this part of the course, when I tried out some exercises based on Emily Ball's book Drawing and Painting People a Fresh Approach, I was still hankering after trying a portrait or two in paint by using a roughly similar process. The head studies in this book are like nothing I've ever seen. At first glance I wasn't sure about the artwork in the - childlike, even primitive, but now this is what particularly attracts me to them,  they seemed to grow on me as I found out more about the thinking process behind them and corresponding techniques.
Here is an example of one in charcoal (below), in acrylic (right) and another of Vincent Van Gogh I tried out for myself:
The techniques used give extraordinary results to put it mildly - will have to work further on this....

Vincent Van Gogh - sorry Vincent

 In Jeffrey Camp's book - Paint a Manual of Pictorial Thought and Advice, a self portrait by Daniel Millar and the two self portraits by Lucien Freud (above) I found the high viewpoints in the three paintings very intriguing, not to mention the brushwork is loose and free. The viewpoints were major factors in my decision to try out a similar angle; using myself as a model rather than another individual was relatively straightforward.

Mostly I chose a self portrait because the last one took me out of my comfort zone in the sense of having to scrutinize my own face at very close quarters, then transferring what I saw onto a surface with paint. I wanted to see if this time round the process would be any easier - it wasn't. Sketches didn't affect me the same way - I think it was the prolonged intensive study of a painting which made the difference. The other reason for a self portrait was having a captive model, so if there was any aspect I wanted to re-check I could easily do so. Otherwise, with another person, they would need to be present, or one would need good photograph/s to refer to, naturally these have their limitations.

another viewpoint
- tonal sketch

Also, I wanted to be more methodical than with some previous colour mixing tests with flesh tones. Two or three short videos on utube helped to steer me back in the right direction. One recommended just using three colours (including white), an earthy red and yellow ochre, pulling colours  into one another to get a full range of skin tones. From another a useful tip was to mix raw umber and ultramarine with white to make general grey tones to reduce the chroma of any mixes which appear too bright.  I found that this didn't really happen on this occasion apart from the rims of the eyes. Conversely a little cadmium red came in handy at times to brighten mixes or 'pinkify' them. These tips were particularly helpful.  I did add a touch of raw umber and ultramarine in various quantities, to thin mixtures of  white and burnt sienna around the outlines of the eyes to tone down. Glazes were also used in one or two other isolated places such as the eyebrows. I like the way the perspective has worked in the background. It plays an important part as it serves to extend the negative space into the distance, adding to the feeling of recession.

Summary
No tonal underpainting on this one - for a change. Proportions were a bit of a struggle in the initial stages, yet I did think I'd solved the conundrum before me until.....almost as soon as I'd finished the painting I realised there still was something wrong. The irony of it was that I think the rough colour study looks much better proportioned, yet no measurements were taken for this - just judged by sight.  I know looking up at the face through a mirror tilted at low angle wasn't exactly the easiest angle to use. But I went ahead with it because I wanted to attempt a different angle from previously, just to see what would happen.

 a colour study

I managed to spot about half way through that the eyebrows were too high, but even after moving the eyebrows down, something was still niggling away that seemed not quite right, yet I could't figure out what. Getting the proportions correct with figures and faces is crucial and when something is out it shows without necessarily identifying itself until later on - exactly what happened here with the eyebrows, but not with the lower face until it was too late to alter things. Despite taking comparative measurements of most areas, there was one I must have forgotten...when I compared by measuring the length of the neck to the face with my own reflection, I found that the lower half of the face is too short in relation to the neck and the upper half of the  head. I thought the neck was too long initially, but it seems to agree with the height of the upper half of the head. This is surprising because I still think it looks too long.  I got a photo taken of my head at the same angle and this helped to confirm things. I am quite irritated with myself for not spotting the discrepancy earlier. At least now I know where I went wrong. 

final painting
before alterations

The outlines of the eyes look too prominent - as if I'm wearing eye liner  which is not the case. It is just shadow, but despite repeated efforts to soften them with various glazes (as above) it isn't enough. And because they looked too light on the colour study I darkened them on the painting, but evidently went over the top. I think the angle of the spotlight on my face tended to iron out some wrinkles and other imperfections, which  is undeniably an aspect I'm in favour of, but admittedly, it is a little removed from reality. The colours are derived from the self portrait of Daniel Millar's. Though he seems to be a virtually  unknown artist I think he's used a great colour combination, giving off a mysteriously moody atmosphere - unfortunately I can't display it for copyright reasons. The brushwork contributes much to this. I think if there is anything else to recommend my own painting, apart from the background area, I think it is the light on the left side of the face, the texture and tones of the hair and the way tones on the lower part  and on the neck seem to swirl round in slightly abstract, rather than realistic way. 

Later alterations - the face is now better proportioned in relation to the neck. I gave the whole painting a makeover and there is now no area completely untouched by alteration or addition of some sort. The rims of the eyes have been softened. The background has been toned down, as advised by my tutor. The neck was too long so I raised the shoulders. I lowered forehead, widened the left nostril and narrowed the left curve of the chin, sketching in lightly with pencil.
The parts to be altered (or re-proportioned) I covered in white paint acrylic, then yellow ochre including the background. The skin tones were too yellow so I 'pinked' them up.
Alterations:
Eye rims - softened using small brush and mal stick with thinned white and yell ochre
Shoulders  re-painted, with burnt sienna and cadmium red.
For flesh tones used a base mix (or mass tone) of white/raw sienna and yellow ochre (touch). I managed to pick up some advice in this regard from an expert on the online forum Wet Canvas. Though I shortly after revised this as it was too yellow even minus the yellow ochre, so I added a small amount of raw umber to the raw sienna and white instead - this appeared to look more in tune with my own basic skin tone.  Following the information I also neutralized the tones under the nose and around the jaw area adding a tiny amount of a mixture of raw umber and black to the mass tone above. The cheeks, nose, lips and ears:
I mixed a touch of cadmium red with the mass tone. Under the chin - touches of alizarin crimson and viridian with the mass tone.

Final painting - post alterations

Note: On my previous attempt, because the warm light was making the flesh tints appear warmer I used an over predominance of yellow ochre in mixes, which include cad red, ultramarine and burnt sienna with white, hence my model (me) had quite a jaundiced look. The reflected light is a little confusing as well as adjacent colours - red  in the top, and green (background. The only reflections i could make out were red from the top onto the neck and lower face. There was no reflection of green as you would expect, because I exaggerated the background green. Hence I manufactured a subtle hint of it later on the skin. I added a retarder to most of the mixes to help prevent the paint drying up too quickly on the palette and so I could work with the paint longer on the painting surface - this helped enormously. I noticed at times, problems with the tonal ranges - often slightly too dark or light, the transitions were jolting. Fortunately I found a magic ingredient - matt gel medium. I didn't appreciate its capabilities at all beforehand, but found that it was very useful in making opaque paint more transparent and easier to blend. It was most useful for semi-transparent mixes used for subtle reflections i.e of the hair colour on parts of the face and neck. 
The light was confusing on the first portrait version. I could see this time that was there was in actuality a good deal of light reflection on the hair and the left side of the face. I lightened some of the hair with burnt sienna and cadmium red adding a little white later to the mix - gel medium added to this appeared to work well for subtle light reflections in the hair. The following glazes enhanced the light reflections on the face and neck and top:
rose pink (cadmium red/raw sienna/white), green (phthalo blue/cadmium red/yellow ochre) then cobalt blue/ yellow ochre - this glaze was thinner and included glazing medium (gloss). I found that the glaze medium was ideal for adding translucency and depth over previous glazes.
The slight changes of skin tone described above, for different areas of the face were something I was prepared to try out and it seemed to work on the whole, despite finding that I needed to alter the occasional small area and go over with a couple of slightly coloured glazes near the end.
I realize what a very subtle balance needs to be achieved with skin tones, for them to look true to the sitter's own and one often has to go through a good deal of trial and error to get there:  the end result (above right)

Telling a Story Exercise 9

I decided to shuffle around various photos of figures in different poses - pics collected from magazines etc. Not having cut and pasted magazine images for any composition before, it was a bit of a challenge, but also an enjoyable novelty.

The number of figures kept on increasing. I eventually cut them down to a manageable number but still ended up with at least three different photos, and I invented some of  the background. The stance and expression of one particular large figure made me think of disagreement even confrontation, so I  used red as a ground colour. Something about it made me think of Egon Schiele's  colour choices - these of course are in keeping with turmoil and upset, which I get the impression was certainly running close to the surface in many of his paintings. The rest of the scheme included greens, dark umbers and blues (almost black) and red tinged flesh colours, again I thought, redolent of Schiele's colour choices.
I would say if the colours seem to jar with one another in places, it has had the desired effect.
After several sketches and colour studies (including and alternative much calmer looking scene) I made a start on the painting with the help of multiple references.

At first I had problems with the paint sinking into the canvas, even though I'd applied two coats of gesso and an undercoat of acrylic. But it was the reverse of the side I would normally use. After the first layer the paint was a little easier to apply. It was hours before I was reasonably happy that the the facial details of the two most prominent figures looked convincing enough. The number of figures increased from two to three to five during the preparatory stages. I was thinking about the possible dialogue taking place between them, the posturing and the facial expressions are what fascinated me most of all.

colour study

colour study

Again I was conscious of trying to obtain an effect similar to Diebenkorn's paint application on and around his figures, but yet again, I couldn't manage to pull it off.
The background didn't gel initially, despite my efforts to keep it simple so as not to distract from the interaction of the figures. The centre area looked too busy , I think as it wasn't adequately blended and the tones didn't balance. Hopefully now it has been softened and the floor darkened the balance is working. At least now it doesn't seem to be fighting for attention, while it has the ability of suggestion and to become part of the narrative, which when also taking into consideration the figures, could be interpreted in several ways. The green and blue tones complement the red ground where it shows through, so that is intended to enhance the tense confrontational mood.

finished painting

Now it's completed I see aspects of the colour study on the red ground which I prefer to the finished painting such as the immediacy of the brushwork and more ground colour showing through. Although some things are out of proportion ie. the head of the figure facing out in the right foreground is too small.

Exercise 8 Figure in an interior

I toyed around with various ideas on how to approach this exercise.
The composition I thought about using was the background used in a famous painting, in combination with  my own sitter. Looking at some of Richard Diebenkorn's figure painting influenced my decision about poses. The Woman in the chair  in particular. Again I like the fact that it was side on and she is looking away. This or a similar pose would fit in with an interior I found of Edward Hopper's - Rooms by the Sea as I thought I could place the sitter against this to appear as if relaxing while looking out to sea.
After trying out a few sketches I decided that the background in my lounge would probably tie better with the reclining pose I had chosen. The shapes and angles present seemed to have more potential interest and could be made to look ambiguous even, together with the sitter, in relation to the direction of light, which I changed from the left side to the right as though shining on the sitter's face. I had to manage this carefully to minimise dazzle. I included a suggestion of a television screen also on the same side - facing the sitter, so leaving me wondering about the contradicting set up of the two, an element I like.

Research Point 3 - Figures in interiors

19th Century

Berthe Morisot - In the Dining Room
Cultural restrictions of her gender at the time limited what subjects Morisot could paint, in the sense that it was regarded as taboo for a woman of her class to be seen alone in many public places.  So, the subjects she painted were mostly of domestic life, family and friends. This particular one is of her maid servant, neatly dressed, looking alert and ready to serve. However I think the artist had a way of bringing sparkle to an otherwise  mundane subject matter. And despite 'respectable' female artist's limitations, Morisot broke away from conventional realism with her lively painting style. As a member of the Impressionist movement she had her own distinctive style characterised by very loose brushwork
The shape of the picture frame echoes the vertical rectangles, which are the dominant shapes. The largest areas of darkest values are balanced between the upper and lower centre of the fugure's clothes. Dark horizontal lines on the window frames and the wall clock direct the viewer's attention to the central figure. Although there is a lot going on in the background, it looks well balanced. This busy scene has been successfully simplified, I think, because of using the same colours and sketchy brushwork as in the figure, so that it doesn't take over the figure as the focus of attention.. Only the areas of orange and flesh tones are picked out in the fruit and other isolated areas, dotted around randomly. In this way attention is drawn to the little dog at the heels of the figure (maid) by the flesh colour of its only visible ear.

The Dining Room, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, 1875
No description available

"Berthe Morisot 003" by Berthe Morisot - The Yorck Project: 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei. DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202. Distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH.. Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Berthe_Morisot_003.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Berthe_Morisot_003.jpg

19th/20th Century

Walter Sickert

http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/edward-hopper/sunlights-in-cafeteria

20th Century

Richard Diebenkorn 
Diebenkorn alternated between figure and abstract painting. He didn't want to be associated with any particular art movement, though at different times was associated with Abstract expressionism (earlier work) and the Bay area figurative movement of 1950s and 60s. Heavily influenced by Matisse his depiction of figures in interiors contained plain areas of colour in geometric shapes,  roughly rectangular, quite vivid, one colour often painted over an underlayer of its complementary, parts of which are very often left visible.
 Woman in Mirror - the main spatial relationships in background are formed by rectangular shapes. The triangle occurs at least twice as a secondary shape, of which orange ones lead the eye to the sitter's head and its reflection in the mirror. No two shapes are exactly alike. Horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines combine to lead the eye to the focal point - the woman's reflection. Coffee is constructed in a similar way:
http://www.wikiart.org/en/richard-diebenkorn/coffee
On studying a number of Diebenkorn's figure paintings I was trying to work out how he applied the paint - they are all done in a similar fashion. I tried to emulate it myself in my own painting of a figure in an interior (practicing on some pieces of gessoed scrap paper) but without much success. Some of the surfaces in these paintings, while looking very textured, they don't look raised. I think the texture is created by the way the paint has been applied rather than the thickness of it. I think now, on looking again later on after a couple of weeks have gone by, that he quite possible used a scrubbing motion, scumbling the paint thinly to achieve the parts of the underlayers still visible. For instance the blue over the orange on the dress is greyed down a little as a result. The muted greys and browns at the top and bottom of the frame intensify the more saturated tones next to them. The intense violets, reds and oranges only fill small parts of the whole but have a big impact, especially the reds and oranges juxtaposed against their complementaries.  This also applies to the reds in the painting on the left. In total their is a good balance of shapes, intense and muted tones.
Link to Woman in Mirror - http://paperimages.tumblr.com/post/7810167224/fineartstef-richard-diebenkorn
This blogsite also contains a large selection of other, mostly large, images of the artist's work, showing the brushwork in great detail. Hopefully this will prove useful to me on future attempts.

21st   Century 

Bradley Wood uses thickly textured oil paint in painterly way. Looking closely at the buttery texture of his painted surfaces I get a sense of how much he must revel in the paint’s thick consistency and the process of  moving it around. His enjoyment of the process is almost tangible in the end result.

He paints scenes (either imagined or real?) inside the large houses situated in a neighbourhood of the ‘well to do’ on the  outskirts of New York city.

It is difficult to pick out any one scene which I like the most but these two are intriguing:
I can't find a title for this one or a link that works - frustrating not being able to locate it. I think it must have been removed from the site. That's a pity as I find this one particularly intriguing. Not to worry though, as there are plenty of other paintings equally deserving of close inspection. In this scene however, all I can offer is a description of my own impression of it:
I get an impression of large space from the sharply receding perspective of the borders between ceiling, wall and floor. It is a decadent looking room, in which a sparsely dressed man is standing at a window holding a pet dog or cat under one arm. The other arm is holding up a viewing instrument of some kind - I would guess he possibly spying on his neighbours. Though I can't see it in this painting, in others the artist occasionally uses distorted perspective and the paint is allowed to drip in places.
This more evident in Reclined 2007 -
http://bradleywoodnyc.com/75812/667080/gallery/unavailable-and-some-older-work
 in a darkened room a woman stands near the edge of the picture frame, with a cigarette in hand, looking out of what is suggested as a window, judging by the lace curtain next to her, flapping about in the breeze and the sunlight from the window illuminating her face. Her whole stance suggests someone deep in thought. behind her the room recedes to a wall with two more brightly lit windows. There are some flowers in a vase on the table in the middle of the room at the left of the painting, helping to break up the space and balance the figure on the other side. But I also see a large dark silhouetted shape on the left edge, quite sinister looking - a real air of mystery and suspense.  Throughout this collection of paintings, contours are wobbly giving them a look of fragility.To me, it all adds up to an impression of a surreal and unearthly world, about to melt like warm ice cream.
Detailed views of his many paintings are available on this link:
http://www.bradleywoodnyc.com/
More information also on these:
http://partsgallery.blogspot.ie/2011/10/bradley-wood-oct-12-nov-6.html
http://www.bradleywoodnyc.com/75812/667080/gallery/unavailable-and-some-older-work

Exercise 7 Conveying character

Patti Smith - American singer-songwriter, poet and visual artist. Medium - acrylic.
A black and white photo - the front page of a magazine, was my only reference for this portrait, albeit a good quality one. After a tonal sketch, did a few colour studies with colour test pieces, to try out various combinations. The reference photo contained a lot of dramatic light and shadow, so I decided to try and convey this atmosphere with unrealistic, perhaps moody colours. A portrait by Oskar Kokoschka - of Adolf Loos was also instrumental in influencing my decisions, both colourwise and the nature of the paint application. http://uploads2.wikipaintings.org/images/oskar-kokoschka/adolf-loos-1909.jpg!Large.jpg
The hair was put in as a loose drippy wash in cyan and black on a cyan background - I wanted to capture the effect of wild unruly hair. It was later strengthened and deepened with darker thicker paint in various colours.

1

2

3 finished

Three stages of the painting.










Throughout the whole painting I used a combination of thick and thin paint, opaque and transparent. For instance I added glazes to soften some areas and opaque paint on mostly the light toned areas, particularly the nose tip, the cheeks, centre of lower lip and chin. Also to intensify the dark areas.
Technical problems: because of the hot dry weather at the time the paint was drying too fast, despite using a staywet palette. Adding  retarder was a huge help to both the paint on the palette  and on the canvas. Bristle brushes seemed to be relatively unresponsive on this occasion, in comparison to when I tried synthetic ones. Again it took ages, repeatedly adjusting and re-adjusting the tones before I was reasonable happy it was finished. Being able  to tell when it was finished was easy, unlike certain others.

The finished painting portrays an element of firm determination in the subject's character, reflected in the expression - the upturned mouth, the gaze and the dark piercing eyes  . I think it also conveys presence as the head is fairly close-up to the frame, maybe a rather ghostly presence. I think the colours and tones I used still retain much of the drama of the photograph. The above elements combine to make it the most successful portrait of the exercises so far - in my opinion. The previous portrait is a close second (see Mood and Atmosphere).

Exercise 6 Creating mood and atmosphere

Initially I thought about trying to use non realistic colours and painting style similar to German Expressionists such as Paula Modersohn-Becker's 'Lee Hoetger and her sister', but somehow I couldn't settle on this. My subconscious wanted a little more realism.  I tried a couple of colour studies of my model thinking that the mood I would like to create was one of calm relaxation. I began with various mixes of blues, greens and purples on a white ground. Somehow my study came out rather more realistic than I first intended and seemed to be constantly fighting against too much simplification.  The method of using blocky paint application didn't seem to tie in with an air of calmness. Should I change the intended outcome to a different or the brushwork or the colours? Should I go more in the direction of Picasso's blue paintings or even Rembrandt? By this stage the sitter had only a certain amount of time so I decided to stick to blues and purples while trying to create an air of quiet introspection. I tried another colour study on a dark ground first. Both versions had their advantages; the white ground it would be easier to retain the lightest lights where the ground is left unpainted creating a vibrant glow. The dark ground it would be easier to retain the darks  ie. the nostril and pupils of the eyes, although I had to re-assert these when they became partly obliterated by lighter paint, due to the awkwardness of the small scale. I think the dark ground would fit the relaxed mood better if I blend the brushmarks more in my next attempt.
At one point during the process of the final painting I became conscoious that I might be finally discovering how to better control the brush. I was now using a wider flat (size 6) in quite small areas, like the eye sockets, with confidence. Also holding it further away from the tip - similar to a knife when spreading butter both hard and soft, I seemed to have improved flexibility in my wrist. It didn't solve the need to use a tiny brush for the finer details of the eyes - but you can't have everything. I scraped back some areas with a plastic card to obtain variation in surface texture and scratched out certain other areas, but these aren't so visible, except to expose some of the raw canvas..
The highlights gradually became so light that I was eventually using the odd touch of pure white in the end.

colour study 1

Finally, the face looks a bit overworked in relation to the top, which I think looks more painterly. On seeing John Minton's  self portrait (Research Point 1) it makes me feel a little better in this regard.

colour study 2

The eyelids appear to be covered in a veil of mist, due to my laboured attempts to add convincing highlights, but they repeatedly slipped into undesired areas, so I reinstated the eyelid creases. This was a very delicate operation which I struggled with repeatedly. I wanted to try a variety of techniques in one painting: 1. all prima - didn't really work as I had to leave the part completed painting and return three or four times over the course of a few days, because my energy levels were very low, due to a heavy cold. As a consequence some paint was  tacky when I painted over it - not ideal. 2. scraping back some still wet areas with a knife or plastic card. I was fairly pleased with the effect as it revealed parts of the mid tone ground  - a thick and thin effect, although the result is only subtle. All the while I subconsciously wanted to achieve a likeness of the sitter, so I found it necessary to fiddle around with the shadow and tonal variations, to try and balance them. It seemed to take forever...

early stages of painting -
the basic tones mapped in

completed painting - this is not a good re-production

Thoughts on the completed painting: The paint in parts does appear to have some expressiveness. It is definitely evocative of a particular mood. Some of the brushmarks on the shirt,  a certain liveliness. On the forehead the wrinkles, along with the faraway look in the eyes, contribute to a tinge of  anxiety   in the sitter's expression, adding a certain edginess to the otherwise calm atmosphere. Aswell as this, the eyes looking away gives the sitter a look of moody  introspection and and mysterious air to the whole. The glow emitted from the light source, onto the face tends to give him an angelic look in a strange way.  The mood is also one of calmness, created mostly I think, by the blues and mauves and the blended brushwork. Both the sitter and  I think it is a good  likeness, fairly realistic, yet a little unusual because of the unrealistic flesh tones. 

Completed painting after alterations

On the initial version there are small rivers of canvas showing through in places. This is because I  had scraped back some of the paint to give a look of unevenness. I don't think, looking at it again, that this effect does anything positive for the painting; the paint looks too sparse and I'm not keen on the appearance of canvas showing through so much now; my tutor didn't criticize this apart from the lower right of the face. Upon revisiting, following certain suggestions she made I worked over this area gently but found it looked thicker and more intense alongside the other areas; they looked faded and hazy in comparison. Despite my attempts to blend and soften it, the lower right side of the face still has a rivulet like appearance,  but this was what I saw.  I started to find fault with many other areas of the face and hair which led me on to continue adding alterations. I also tried to quieten down the background by blending the paint more. Doing this and adding another layer using slightly darker tones than the previous layer, I think it has also had the effect of bringing the face into dramatic focus, reminiscent of chiaroscuro.

this study was considered as possible
 alternative option.

I didn't try to disguise the beard and facial hair, but rather tried to soften its appearance. I think it does mostly softer in spite of a dark shadow  on the right, contrasting quite strongly with the light grey beard. This shadow is what I could see so I didn't try to tone it down. In the end it is pretty evident that virtually the whole painting has undergone an alteration/addition of some sort, even so I am quite confident that this has been to its advantage.