Lines
 

Dear all,

Hope you can help me with this issue. Here's a new portrait I am working on. I am on the third day of work on it but I still have one doubt. As you can see from the image the boy is sitting on the stairs. My question is: is the bannister, whose direction coincides with the line of the shoulder, somehow disturbing?

I thought I might shift its direction a little, but am not sure if instead the fact that this two strong diagonals meet on the boy's eye actually enhances the eye itself, which is very beautiful.

I already had to rotate the original photo a little to correct the perspective and make the slits almost vertical.

Thanks for advising on this or any other issue

Ilaria

Hi Ilaria,

I think you are right about that. I would lift the lower end of the banister out so that one can see the banister post at the end. That would sort of echo the figure of the boy.

Allan

Thank you
 

Thank you Allan, I guess I will change it. I am not sure about the post though. Initially I left it out, but maybe it would made the perspective stronger

I'll post again the revised work.

Thank you!
Ilaria

Slant of head
 

Hi Ilaria -

Check out the top left part of his head (our right). To me, it looks like you could flesh this out by adding some width. Looks a little too slanted an angle to me.

About the bannister - maybe if you brought it out farther at the bottom?

Hi Ilaria,

You might consider getting rid of the bannister and supports altogether, and instead, move the wainscoting down to support the center of interest, sort of like Norman Rockwell's Saturday Evening Post covers.

I think it is really difficult to use architectural elements, even if handled loosely, without painting them quite accurately. In your photo, the bannister looks as if is not only moving behind the boy, but, simultaneously away from him.

Thank you, Chris and Julie.
I will reconsider all the composition since I am fairly at the beginning.

I really love to have elements behind the subject, so that he or she is placed somewhere in a domestic environment.
It is true though that a straight line should remain a straight line also in a losely painted work, I 'll have to have a better look at J.S.S., I guess.

Since I am a mother of three boys and I particularly love this subject, I am posting a portrait by an Italian painter of the early 20th century who is a great source of inspiration. This window is often in the back of my mind when I paint. Hope you'll enjoy.
Thank you again
Ilaria

Ditto - Chris is correct. I just had to comment. Get rid of the railing. Even a scumbled-marble like backdrop is more effective. Use a muted cloudy colour that you feel will enhance the boy's presence and compliment the flesh and clothes.

I'll add my vote to those who recommend getting rid of the bannister altogether. As Chris pointed out, architectural elements that aren't painted absolutely accurately (even if in a painterly way) will distract from anything else that may be right with a painting. And the position of it makes it look like it's growing out of his shoulder now.

Hi Ilaria,

The painting by the Italian artist is a good example of using rectangular shapes within a rectangular shape to help focus the composition onto the subject. If you are really interested in these types of scenes you might start a notebook of similar compositions and compare how each artist handled problems such as dark head against light background, light head against dark, lost edges and soft edges, warm against cool, landscape outside vs. empty space, etc. Directing the eye with shapes frequently seems to me less "obvious" than directing the eye with line. (Compositional issues are on my mind too because I am starting a similar notebook on the topic "circles")

And I like how you have painted the boy, by the way. :sunnysmil

Notebook
 

Linda,
actually this is a really good idea, as I do sometimes end up frantically leafing through books looking for that special painting I have seen months before.
I have almost finished the portrait, and I got rid of the bannister as it had a feeling of someone within bars. I painted the mouldings of a door in the background, going back to the rectangular scheme again.
In a sense it was a way out to avoid a background with a nothing, though it is a much less real place than the room where the boy with the boat is.
It's an acceptable solution when you cannot rally paint on the spot, I think.
I am working also on three more portraits on the same theme,I will post everything as soon as it's done
Thank you as usual
Ilaria