Tag Archives: portrait art

Mr. + Mrs. Lowry

Happy one month anniversary to Hannah and Zach Lowry who were married on November 1st at a beautiful ceremony at the Tapestry House. Hannah was a stunning fall bride. It was fun attending and seeing a bunch of my former co-workers and celebrating their marriage.

Both Hannah and Zach have ridiculously kind families (no wonder they both turned out to be such great people). It was really nice meeting everybody.

My go-to wedding gift in always a handmade portrait of the couple. This little watercolor of the happy couple measures 4×6” and I’m glad that the bride and groom said I did them justice! Below is also a start-to-finish time lapse video of the painting process. Enjoy!

“Hannah and Zach.” Watercolor, 4×6”.

Erin and Darin

A little over a year ago, my sister-in-law and brother-in-law asked if we wanted their dining room table set. It was a high quality table with matching chairs in great condition. Our set at the time was completely mismatched, so we agreed to exchange their dining room set for a portrait painting. Originally, Erin and Darin were interested in getting a portrait of my nieces and nephew, but it was hard finding a picture they liked. Over a year went by, and they finally decided on a picture from their trip to Hawaii.

Building up all of the layers of colors.

It was a challenging painting because of all of the different textures (blowing hair, hat mesh, beard stubble, detailed sunglasses, ocean, etc), but it was a lot of fun to work on. Life got busy, so I had to work on it in small chunks of time over the course of a couple of months. You can see in the in-progress photo how gradual the build-up of layers was (another reason why it took a long time).

I’m beyond excited over the final results! I can’t wait to see what it looks like displayed in their new house.

“Erin and Darin.” Watercolor, 11×14”

Kristy

The first time I met Kristy was through our church’s religious education program, but I’ll always associate our friendship with our high school marching band where she played flute and mellophone. Speaking of marching band, when I think of Kristy I think of the phrase, “March to the beat of your own drum.” She is very passionate, and when she finds something she cares about, she throws herself into it with full enthusiasm. That gung-ho attitude balanced with sensitivity and intellect is something I’ve always loved about her. She’s a voracious reader, loves her dog, and has a very caring family.

The painting of Kristy is all done in watercolors on Arches hot press watercolor paper. I’m especially happy with how her eyes and hair turned out.

“Kristy.” Watercolor, 8×10″

Raven

Right before the beginning of the new year, I was watching a Blessed is She talk that recommended that you pick a word to reflect on for the new year. The word that was whispered to my heart was “ordinary.”

Shortly after, I was brainstorming ideas for a collective body of artwork to produce. I wanted to build up a new portfolio and though I had a couple ideas of directions I was interested in, I wasn’t sure what I would ultimately create. I do a lot of portrait work which means I need lots of human references. I thought it might be fun to use friends and family for portrait practice or references for future paintings.

I sent out a “model call” on Facebook asking if anyone would be willing to let me use their photos for practice. I was only expecting maybe 5 people would volunteer. I ended up getting over 30 (and counting) interested friends and family members. Inspiration struck and that word “ordinary” went through my mind. I wanted to create a series of portraits of ordinary women using mixed media processes.

The first of these portraits is Raven, a talented photographer I met through a mom’s group at church. When I saw this self portrait of her, I knew this was the image I would use for the piece I wanted to create. She had some beautiful photographs of her children that had a really lovely purple and blue lighting that I wanted to draw into this piece as an underpainting.

The majority of the painting was created with watercolors. I used pens for the linework in the hair, varnished the piece, and added thin layers of acrylics on top.

In progress shots of my portrait of Raven.

The finished portrait of Raven. Watercolor and mixed media 8×10”