Author: virginiacmccoy

“A portrait is a painting with something wrong with the mouth.”

and

“Every time I paint a portrait, I lose a friend.”

Sadly, a lot of the time it appears that he is right.  With the first quote, anyway.  I have not lost a friend, yet, that I know of, and I don’t know that Sargent did, either.  But, I have never, yet, gotten a mouth right.  LOL!

Okay, I got some constructive criticism from a faithful follower of my blog.  He is very good about pointing out what he sees that could be improved with my art and I appreciate it very much.  I really do want to improve.  I don’t just want everyone to praise me.  Although, I like praise very much, too much, and, just like everyone else, I am embarrassed and my vanity suffers when criticized, I need good, honest, kind criticism.  So, after receiving some from a blog follower and from a forum where I posted the drawing, I made some changes.  I knew it was not right, but I couldn’t see what it was, exactly.  I added more volume to her hair on the back of her head, which, after it was pointed out to me was so painfully obvious.  LOL!  And, I took away some of the chin.  I know it is not perfect, but I feel it looks much more like Elsie, now.  I would like to offer my thanks to those who care enough to tell me the truth, even if it hurts.  And, even if I choose not to heed the advice.

Below are the before, after, and reference photo:

I do not need it to look exactly like the reference photo, but it is very important to me that it actually look like Elsie.  If someone looks at the picture and says, “Oh, that’s Elsie!” then, even if it is not a xerox copy, it is a success.  But, if someone who knows her says, “Wow!  That is beautiful!  Who is it?”  It is a miserable failure.  LOL!  To tell you the truth, my drawing looks, to me, like a cross between Diane Keaton and Lauren Bacall.  What do you all truthfully think?

God offers to every mind its choice between truth and repose.  Take which you please — you can never have both.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

Well, I drew a portrait of Elsie with pencil on sanded paper, which is a lot like regular old sandpaper.  I am using very fine grit.  I like to blend with my fingers, because they are handy and I don’t have to think too much about it or search around my table to find them.  LOL!  Well, try rubbing your finger on sandpaper for a few hours…  Yep!  Dumb thing to do.  But, I will probably continue to do it.

 

Oh, a portrait?  Oh, yeah.  I started it late last night and finished it this afternoon.

Also, check out the post below for more nifty photos.

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art… It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival.

— C. S. Lewis

Toby and I took a walk this morning and it was very wet.  The mosquitoes were hungry and it was overcast, also.  But, we got some good photos.

I don’t know what the below is, but it is pretty:

Sweet White Violet:

Jelloway Creek:

Dogwood:

Dogwood and the Howard Tunnel:

Below is my old lilac bush, which I planted, from a seedling, about 14 years ago.  I have had the hardest time getting it to bloom, but this year it appears to have given in and put out about seven blooms.  Oh, I love the smell of lilacs!  They smell clean.

Below is our lovely crabapple tree, which I planted from a seedling at the same time as the lilac.  It is blooming like crazy!  I love it!  That is all one tree.  It is much taller than our house.  That puny little lilac is still not as tall as I am.

Crabapple blossoms under a beautiful blue sky that I was able to catch between clouds:

River Birch:

Red Bud:

Sweet Purple Violet:

The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks.

— Tennessee Williams

 

I love the little Spring Beauty flowers that pop up in the spring.  I also love all the other little things that can be found.

I even love the big things that pop up, or plop down, in the spring.  LOL!

You ask of my companions. Hills, sir, and the sundown, and a dog as large as myself that my father bought me. They are better than human beings, because they know but do not tell.

— Emily Dickinson

Today, I had my friend, Elsie, over for a fun photo shoot.

We were just playing around, but I think we got some good shots.  The fabric is draped over the treadmill and a lamp was put on the side.  Then, after a while, I turned out all the lights and just adjusted the camera exposure and got some very lovely shots.  The one above and below are taken through a telephoto converter attachment, which had dirty spots on it, which made a nifty misty feel.  I suppose at some point I am going to have to clean the spots off…  Elsie was a wonderful model and I really enjoyed the photo shoot.

And here is some more drawing practice:

My guy does not look like the guy in the book, but at least he looks human!  LOL!

Most of us don’t need a psychiatric therapist as much as a friend to be silly with.

— Robert Brault

I have finally made some time to take some photos from the back porch during this gray and rainy day.

Our crabapple appears to be preparing for a grand show, this year.  Year before last, she was dressed like a victorian bride.  Last year, she had approximately four blooms.  Any day now, she will be in glorious full bloom.

Our maples are doing their thing, too.  Such beautiful colors!

I am getting in some drawing practice while I am making some hardboard painting panels and waiting for the oil ground that I will put on them before using them for oil painting.  I bought a 4×8 sheet of tempered hardboard at Lowe’s and they cut it into 21 panels for me:  18 12×16’s and 3 16×24’s.  All for $8.00!  To get that many from the art supply store would have been about $50-$60.  I had to buy gesso and oil ground, but still it works out to be much cheaper and I have a stack of panels.  Yay!  I am going to cover some of them in “canvas”.  I am actually using muslin fabric.  I will also try some osnaberg (sp?) and see how that works.  I think it is very nifty making my own canvases.  It is a process, though.  I am putting two layers of acrylic gesso, letting them dry for a couple of days, then I will apply two coats of oil ground and let that dry for about a week, then sand lightly with fine sandpaper and hopefully they will be ready.  This is a simpler process than some people do, but this is my first try at it.  I want to keep it as simple as possible.  We will see…

Anyway, here is some of my drawing practice:

Can you guess what is next?  Right!  Mouths!  LOL!

I bought an ebook by one of the artists that is inspiring me right now:  Cuong Nguyen.  His drawing lesson book.  You need to know how to draw to do art, especially portraits, but pretty much anything.  So, if you are an artist, new or experienced, you should be practicing your drawing whenever you get a chance.

What am I reading?  Well, I finished the book on George Washington a while back.  It was very good.  The author revealed a little bit of an agenda, but otherwise it was very good.  I enjoyed it and cried when Washington died and then, again, when Martha died.

Since then, I have read a collection of Louis L’Amour short stories and several other books, but don’t remember them all right off hand.  I am in the process, right now, of reading The Westminster Confession of Faith for Study Classes by G. I. Williamson, O! Pioneers by Willa Cather, and Love, Lucy, An Autobiography by Lucille Ball.

 

The countenance is the portrait of the soul, and the eyes mark its intentions.

— Cicero

I finally finished this one.  I actually just got tired of it.  I like it, but I don’t love it.  LOL!  Just practice…  I’m still learning how to use oil paints.  I have learned, so far, that oil paints may not be as bad as I initially thought.

This is what it looked like the last time I posted it:

I think the photo was taken from an angle last time, but this time I took some time to get a good photo.  Now, I need to finish the lilacs picture.  Maybe I will have it done in time for my real lilacs that are going to bloom soon.

 

The man who is too old to learn

was probably always too old to learn.

— Henry S. Haskins

 

Today, Mr. Beloved and I went to our favorite hatchery and picked up 19 Buff Orpington chicks:  18 females and one male.  We have been without chickens for a year.  New baby chicks are so much fun.  I have done no art since my last post.  However, I have been thinking about it…  LOL!  Enjoy a few chick pics.

Many years ago, I got our first chicks home and in the brooder, then I sat down to watch them for a while and I noticed, with panic in my heart, that they were slowly, one by one, closing their eyes and falling face first into the bedding.  “Oh, no!  They’re dying!”  After a few minutes of wringing my hands, wondering what to do, I realized that they were just sleeping.  LOL!  They got x’s on their eyes, just like in the cartoons!  It’s hilarious.

After we got this batch all settled, we let Toby out in the garage and he screeched to a halt and his head went cockeyed and he looked at me like, “What’s that noise?”  He was intensely interested for about a minute and then was bored.  I didn’t get a good photo of him on the floor next to the brooder, because it was so dark.

We made this brooder to hold fifty chicks, many years ago from scrap wood and some screens that I found on the side of the road that someone was throwing away.  It has served us well, but after we are done with it for this year, I will be giving it away.  We will use something much smaller and more portable and easier to store for future batches.  This one is portable, because it has casters and can be rolled out of the way, but it has a large footprint and we need the space for other stuff.  I don’t believe we will be doing large batches of birds anymore.

Here is a photo of our first rooster, Girard.  He was the best rooster we ever had.  I hope our new one will be half as good.

As of the time of my typing this post, the chicks are several hours old and I just went down to check and there were NO EGGS!  They better get a move on!  LOL!

Welcome, welcome, little stranger,
Fear no harm, and fear no danger;
We are glad to see you here,
For you sing “Sweet Spring is near.”

— Louisa May Alcott

I did this portrait of this man about a year ago.  I have NO idea why I thought it was finished.  After I was able to touch up Anjali and fix her portrait after ruining it, I immediately thought of this one and wondered if I could do the same.  He has always bothered me, but I didn’t realize to what extent he was such a mess.  Apparently, I had not realized just how green his skin WAS!  LOL!  Plus, I didn’t have as many shadows as I should have and the ones that were there were not strong enough.  Etc., ad nauseam…  Anyway, I was able to spray fixative on him and give him a major facelift.  I think he appears much better off, although I am willing to admit that maybe in the future I may see other things about him that need improving.  If anyone ever sees anything wrong or bothersome about my art, feel free to let me know.  Of course, if it makes you swoon in ecstasy, please let me know that, also.

Presenting the new and improved old bearded fisherman:

So that you can compare easily, I will place them side by side:

Vive La Difference!  Eh?

By the way, we have broken in our fishing gear for this season.  We went fishing on Tuesday at Ariel Foundation Park and poor Mr. Beloved spent an inordinate amount of time teaching me to cast and how to untangle line.  We haven’t been fishing since we lived in Florida, about 17 years ago.  Can you believe it?  Well, we are remedying that situation.  Mr. Beloved, by the way, took to it like he had never stopped.  I did not have my camera with me.  I will have to remedy that situation, also.  And, no, we did not go catching, we went fishing…

There is certainly something in angling that

tends to produce a serenity of the mind. 

— Washington Irving