For someone who says she doesn’t paint the standard ‘head shot’ types of portraits, I certainly have done a few. Sometimes I take the commission, but just don’t post it here; as it’s not the type of work that represents what I do.
And yet, it does.
Sure, my paintings are usually animated or goofy or expressive, but I will sometimes take the opportunity to explore the more serious expression of contrasts between shadow and light — as with this latest commission. Frustrated with the lack of expression that this little guy offered, I fell back to what I love most. I suppose I could have emphasized the light more, but in this dark month of social distancing, hand-washing, and hand-wringing, the darkness came forward.
I’m one of those few people who loves turning the clocks back in the Fall to welcome the darkness descending into the afternoon. I read tarot and look to the shadowy aspects of the cards which (in more of a Jungian sense) reveal our darker urges and motivations, coaxing them up into the light. And so it is here, with Rummy, one eye obfuscated as we try to discern a hint of a lash or a lid as it peers out from its safe reclusivity.
canvas major 