So I had another go at Amy, this time without a head. I started from…
KeiraG
I didn’t want to go straight back to the oil pastels today. I had this feeling that if I did go for them I’d be impatient and rushed. Better to leave them where they were and go for the inktense pencils. Today’s model is Keira G. She’s making her debut but has another pose that’s high up on my to paint list.
I started with a faint graphite pencil drawing, then added the inktense pencils. For colours, I started with bark in the darkest places. I then added poppy red to all the hair, being especially heavy with the red on the ends of the strands. Then I applied some leaf green and iris blue to the body. It felt like I needed a bit more colour (when actually what I needed was less green) so I added some violet and fuchsia and a little more of the poppy red.
Finally I added the water, trying to follow the contours of the body as usual but also applying some squiggly marking on the ends of the hairs.
The hair actually ended up looking pretty good, with the red colour and the squiggly mark making both working. And I managed to leave more white areas showing than usual, which was good. But otherwise, this was my worst bit of figure drawing in a long while. It’s the initial graphite pencil drawing that’s let it down. Keira’s right arm looks too small and her lower torso too wide and too tall. She looks pregnant to be honest. And leaf green and purple (a) don’t go well together and, (b) have both been overused in th8s painting. This one goes down as a big fail and won’t be put up for sale.
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