Thread: Self-portrait
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Old 05-16-2006, 07:06 AM   #5
Mary Jane Ansell Mary Jane Ansell is offline
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Location: Brighton, England
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Marina, I think it's lovely - to me you are capturing a real sense of your elegance and warmth, which I think is very rare in self portraits. It's fittingly classical too - Ingres and David come to mind immediately... an intentional reference I shouldn't wonder?

I do agree that the neck, particularly on the viewers left, isn't working yet though - I wonder if you are just trimming a bit off your jaw there? I'd be tempted to give the area a wash of the darker pink from your lower cheek and rework the highlights. And perhaps you could narrow the neck slightly to add to the elegance of the pose.

There's also perhaps a little too much going on in the highlights of your eyes that is giving your expression a slightly glazed feel - its marginal but your gaze is so wonderful otherwise that I think its worth trying to rectify this small issue... to me there's a slightly pink bulge in the white of your eye furthest to the left edge of the painting that I'd even out... and I wonder if the highlight under your inner lash line in the other eye needs darkening?

That's what I would probably be tempted to fiddle with first anyway - my apologies for being so particular because I really do think its lovely. Hope you will post it again if you do rework it!
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