Little Wing

Just a portrait of a giraffe today, albeit one with a bird attached to its neck. This one was inspired by a holiday photo in Zimbabwe by Derek, an old friend from uni. It was a great photo, a detailed full frontal of a giraffe’s face, with that bird too, and enough shadow on the face to make things interesting.

This is a posterised painting, using the trippy scheme and following my usual process. I threw in some pre-painting spatters, possible because I only masked out a tiny band around the giraffe rather than the while background. I masked out a couple of extra spots in the eyes, looking to create some personality. And after seeing that some of the French ultramarine was starting to granulate, I couldn’t resist sprinkling some salt over the second and final layer of paint.

It’s not my best, this one. My best portraits look like witchcraft: a set of random marks that create a likeness. With this one, the French ultramarine in the second layer looks a bit too random, with lots of its features not adding anything to the likeness or the texture. But that’s probably me being overly critical. I expect people will be wowed by the colours. This one’s going up for sale, with the price to be found here.

<About five hours later, someone on LinkedIn suggested that this painting looked like a Rorschach test. And, you know what, it does! I like it a bit more now.>