Woman
 

OK, Chris!

You nabbed me, the open studio queen.This is from the Scottsdale Artist's School on Monday. She is Pat, a mature and wonderful local. This is on a warped piece of canvas board 20" x 18" that I wanted to loosen up, since I have not been doing oils much.

Although it is not as good a likeness as I want, I am pleased with the energy and the fact that in three hours I managed to cover the canvas! Thanks for the idea of open studio. I feel very comfortable here.

Yes, indeed!

Lovely job, Debra. This portrait has so much freshness and movement to it. I also often find that the three hours sail by and I fail to get around to covering the surface, so I appreciate this very much, particularly since 20" x 18" is a lot of surface area.

Debra,

That is one fine painting!

Bill

It's awesome! And is it any less a fine painting for the short time it took? No way! It is the short time that defines your fresh style and flare. Art is as much in the limitations as the excesses.

Beautiful
 

Debra - beautiful work. Congratulations on your recent award; be assured it's just the first!

And to the Forum moderators, I'm very grateful for this new area and look forward to posting here after next weeks' John de la Vega workshop. :thumbsup:

I have to agree...
 

Debra: Wonderful painting!

This is exactly what we had envisioned for this topic. I hope you and others will contintue to post and participate. :)

My! Thank you, I am thrilled
 

Open studio is such a race for me, but it is always like an athlete challenging myself on the scale of others. This piece was one I went to bed tired of, and woke up to find I had done good.

She is being unwarped in a strong frame at my day job right now. When she flattens I may try to give her a better home and see what develops.

Thank you all for you warm support.

Debra, I admire your skill and ability to paint in this spontaneous manner. I have not learned to resist the urge to fix everything and make it look perfect and thus have become a prisioner to the neverending quest of being a perfectionist.

Have you always painted like this or do you start fixing things once you are in your studio?

Oy! Was this fixed!
 

If you had seen it an hour before it was done, you would not ask the question!

I struggled all the way. One of the problems with a live model in a group, not for my own personal reference, is that they are human. She had an elegant profile of the eyelash, nose and chin, the reflected light on the top of her shoulder was nearly blue! Lots of nifty stuff, but when she came back every 20 minutes it was different. By the fourth pose the wonderful red of her shirt never showed again.

One cannot complain; it is only $6 a session! Bargain for the work. I got lots of nice texture because there are so many layers of paint!

A secret for the alla prima effect for me, is that if I don't sketch or pencil in my guidelines, I use no oil, just turps to thin. That way it does not stay wet, but will eventually dry a bit, at least enough to tooth and take more paint.

As far as AFTER the model leaves. I MAY fiddle a bit on the breaks between, but mostly on the background or clothes, but try like mad not to mess with the face. After all, I don't have a reference so what am I trying to improve upon?

Thanks for asking. Sometimes spontaneous is actually more like panic.

I feel better now, but I still could not pull this off. I look forward to seeing more.

Nice job, but you must be kicking yourself that you did it on a warped piece of canvas board...it certainly deserved better.

I remember those life classes when I actually did a decent drawing - but on a piece of crummy old ripped newsprint. Dang.

Oh, Karin, if you only knew!
 

Not that this Forum generally is in need of "tips", but the day I invested in a roll of pre-primed canvas, my life changed!

Whether I tape it to a board or just quickly staple it on bars, for open studio it is so much easier to carry, as flexible as a paper drawing, so far as resizing a bit; the appearance of canvas is nothing like the art board stuff they call canvas board, and I believe in the long run I really saved money.

Another great open studio trick I do is take scraps and tape all of my odd size pieces on a large piece of masonite or two and for short poses I can do really nice speed sketching and come up with very interesting color or value studies.

Yeah, I am bored with board... he he he.

Selected for St. Louis show
 

I am bringing this to the top, because I just got a letter from the St. Louis Artist's Guild, that it has been accepted (ALONG with my painting of Pirate Ted, which got me a finalist in The Artist's Magazine this year) for their show "Face It: Portraiture".

Paul Levielle was the juror. I was quite surprised, opening the envelope finding only ONE of three submitted slides.

It is very exciting for me and the challenge of crating and shipping is rather new. I hope it is the hardest part. And of course, the suspense until the show.

Many congratulations, Debra! We'll look forward to the results.

Congratulations Debra
 

I really enjoy looking at your work. It has a very assertive quality, I'm sure you will do well, for now and in the future. Keep us informed.

Jean

Way to go Debra. Your works deserves the recognition.

Fantastic! And to be selected by such an accomplished judge.

I've been admiring your work since I found this website.

Best of luck.

Congratulations!

I'm so happy for you!

When is the show and can we follow it online?