Gypsy Man WIP

I am working on this painting that I am calling “Gypsy Man” for want of a better title. The photo was taken by Pierre Gonnord, a French photographer living in Spain. His photos reminded me of our own interactions with gypsies when we lived in Spain. One of these days I need to write a story about that. Well, I am working on a painting and a drawing at the same time. The painting is a little larger than life-size. The drawing a little smaller. I am really struggling with it. But, hey! Don’t I struggle with everything! LOL! Anyway, I just wanted you all to know that, yes, I am still working on art. Just very slowly.

The charcoal sketch on a 16×24 gessoed MDF panel. I tried to mix some burnt umber into the gesso and it was too dry to actually mix into it, so when I applied it, the burnt umber was in lumps and smeared onto the panel. LOL! It looks like woodgrain. Oh, well. It works. It will be covered with paint.
A half of a first paint layer. I loved the charcoal sketch so much that I was afraid to put the paint over it. It was hard. But, I think I will like it in the end.
I loved the charcoal sketch so much that I decided to work on a graphite portrait of the same man at the same time.
Slowly but surely. It helps me to have the eyes done quickly. I don’t know why. They are not completely done, but enough to make a difference.

I must confess that I am a little shy of showing my process. I am of the same feeling as Norman Rockwell. He said that he could never work with someone watching. Me, too! It just about locks me up. This last time that I was painting outdoors with people going by, I didn’t accomplish a thing.

Well, back to the ol’ drawing board…

I don’t think there’s any artist of any value who doesn’t doubt what they’re doing. — Francis Ford Coppola

Leave a Reply

Please log in using one of these methods to post your comment:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s