Chase and Peyton
 

A while ago, I posted some of the prep work for this portrait. Here is the finished portrait.

And some details:

Peyton

Chase

Little Hands and fingers:

As predicted in the finely wrought preliminary stages, it's very beautiful, an instant heirloom.

I've always wondered which of double subjects gets the painting eventually. Did you score the canvas down the middle for an eventual Solomonic disposition?

Steven:

Thanks for your comments. From the start, it was my hope that someday these girls would fight over who gets the portrait - not to sow seeds of dissention in their family, but hopefully to have them like and value the work that much. We shall see... :)

Michael,

You have done a wonderful job on this portrait.I really feel that the background works beautifully with the design and subject placement.

Could you speak briefly to the colors and approach to decisions about this background?

p. s. The only solution for this family is to order another double portrait. In the interest of long-term familial harmony, of course.

Chris: Thanks for your comments! The color scheme for this portrait was determined by the client's home. The floors are dark hardwood, the walls are a cream yellow and a tuscan orange - the furniture, side mouldings, and crown mouldings are mostly dark wood and leather.

The actual dresses are blue. When we began discussing the portrait, the cool blue of the dresses became a concern for the portrait integrating into their color scheme. We made a decision to make the dresses yellow in the painting, and minimize the background detail to make the painting look more elegant. This meant an all warm color scheme for the painting.

In the underpainting, you may recall that I had a lot more light showing in the background behind the girls. I got a tip from Bill Whitaker about that - he felt that that sort of "light flare" behind the head was more of a photographic look and that the portrait would look "more real" if I did something else for the background.

He advised me to look at some of the more famous portraits and see how those artists addressed backgrounds. I looked at portraits from Bouguereau, Ingres, Raphael, etc. In many of these portraits, the background was often a single color with little if any value variation.

So I ended up with a background that I feel gives the feeling of space behind the girls - a slight graduation in value from bottom to top and a slight reddening of the hue from bottom to top.

The actual background is not quite as dark as it appears in the photos. You don't quite lose the edges of the hair in the actual painting, but the values come quite close.

I hope that answers your question. :)

And yea I agree, they just need another portrait to keep both girls happy!

Michael, the painting looks wonderful. It wants me to take the girls, especially the younger one and give them a big squeeze. I agree the parents should commission another painting. Having only one will be asking for sister

Enzie:

Thanks for your kind comments. :)