Painting Progress, Self-Comparisons to Tolouse-Lautrec, and Phosphorescent

[ My portrait of Jordan as it stands. ]

Today's blog will be a photo essay of the progress of my current painting in progress: my portrait of the great Jordan Sabolick (friend and musician). I started it in January as a part of my "The Beatniks, The Bastards, & The Saints" series, neglected it for months, and have been back on it with a fury for a while now. Painting is very therapeutic. It calms whatever restlessness and gloom you have looming over you. Probably because you're zoning out and using your brain in a completely different way. Probably cause good tunes are also involved. My painting playlist right now is pretty awesome. It's a like a bluegrass/country/alternative/gospel/acoustic mega playlist mainly consisting of Phosphorescent, Dead Man's Bones, A.A. Bondy, Avett Brothers, Tallest Man On Earth, Whiskeytown, and Neko Case. So it's all whiskey, drinkin', trains, cheatin', broken hearts, southern winds, and Jesus. It's as mellow and soulful as a gospel revival choir and as amplifying as a country bluegrass hoedown.


I intend to finish Jordan's face up tomorrow and hopefully even get started on his hair. Then it's smooth sailing from there. Just background and tattoos. Wish me luck.


- Amy
Listening to: Phosphorescent's "It's Not Supposed To Be That Way"

An actual portrayal of my level of excitement upon starting this painting once the sketch was done (check out that pale, January skin). Starting a new painting makes my stomach hurt because I'm always afraid I've forgotten how to paint. I wonder if that's a recognized fear in the psychology world? I'm guessing not. ]

Closeup of the sketch.

This stage was about where my fears seemed to be completely founded. Yes I must have forgotten how to paint. His arm turned out swimmingly, but his face... oh, his face. It kind of looked twisted-ly grand however, so I went to bed and knew things would shape up the next sitting.

I decided that I had to get a piece completely done so as to boost my waning artistic ego. So I finished an eye and some of his nose. Confidence was growing.

Second eye done in the third sitting. I'm really digging the Tolouse-Lautrec -esqu garish coloring that's happening. After doing all of these graphic portraits recently (John Wayne, Caleb Followill, Geoff Rowley) I've been wanting to paint more the way I do those. In bright colorful shapes as opposed to perfectly accurate shading.