New painting : The Lizzi show

This is my latest painting. It's my friend Lizzi.

She's my most depicted friend in my art work.

I think this is partly because she lives the closest to me, so I can quickly pop round to get a photo or draw her, and partly because of the hair.

Here's some of my previous Lizzi art.

This was a drawing I did for my A-level art work.

Lizzi sat for me and I think we put a The OC dvd on to keep her occupied.

This was another A level piece.

We had a lot of fun taking photos for this piece.

Every so often we talk about doing an updated version now that her shoe collection is way bigger.

This was a piece I did for fun to experiment with adding textures on the painting.

See what I mean about the hair?

This painting was done during my first year at university.

This is the only painting Lizzi's actually asked me to do, a portrait of her and her boyfriend for his birthday.

I think I should start painting my other friends or I might start getting accused of favouritism.

Latest painting

My friend Lizzi recently commissioned me to paint a portrait of her and her boyfriend for his birthday.

Lizzi was really pleased with the painting, and her boyfriend loved it too.

Yes, this is the same friend I made the plushie Starbucks cup for.

Paint, Cake, and Lady A

Today I wanted to share this new painting that I completed.

I haven't done much painting recently and when I have it's been landscapes so I thought I'd sharpen up the portraiture skills.

The canvas I used originally looked like this.

Urgh.

A painting from many years ago that I gave up on because it was just not going well.

(Sorry to Laura and Lizzi for making you look like disfigured zombies)

A couple of coats of white emulsion later and the canvas was good to go for a second round.

Now do you guys want to know what I did for my birthday?

I went to see Lady Antebellum in London with my sister!!!

The tickets were a birthday gift from my parents.

They were soooo good!

It was a great night.

I love this photo I took of Charles.

That man knows how to belt out a tune!

Incase you were wondering; my birthday cake tasted delicious.

Here it is all lit up.

Yes, there are 22 candles on it.

And speaking of cake, my friend Stef got me 6 cupcakes from Hummingbird Bakery.

(I may have not been able to wait until my camera battery charged to take a photo of them before I tried one)

And I finally got to try a red velvet cake that the blogosphere raves about. Pretty darn good!

There are two red velvet and four vanilla, and that icing is sa-weeet!

BP Portrait Award

I was in London at the weekend so I popped in to the National Portrait Gallery to see this year's BP Portrait Award.

I've been to see it every year since I was 16 when I went with school for art.

Maybe one year I'll get round to entering it.

Today You Were Far Away by Ian Cumberland

This painting by Ian Cumberland was my favourite of the portraits exhibited.

It's a self portrait and has the kind of title that I like; it's suggestive of a story, and probably quite an angsty one at that. He just looks so sad!

And this guy has mad painting skills. The painting is quite large (1500x1000mm) and there's an incredible amount of detail gone in to it.

Bruised by Nathalie Beauvillain Scott

I also liked this painting by Nathalie Beauvillain Scott of her son.

He had been in a car accident and a violent attack, and the pictures in the background show him as a child, and the car involved in the attack.

It's an interesting concept to give additional information about the subject of the portrait by showing relevant images alongside them.

Self-Portrait by Jean-Paul Tibbles

What I liked about this portrait by Jean-Paul Tibbles (besides the artist's surname) was the way the eyes had been painted with really precise detail, but then the painting gets a bit rougher towards the edges. I think this helps to put the focus on the sitter's eyes to really draw in the viewer.

As part of my A level art course, a few years ago now, I did a whole project on portraiture. To get more information on the subject I emailed a bunch of the artists exhibiting in that years BP Portrait Award.

One of my favourite responses was from Morgan Penn who told me;

"-Art college taught me absolutely nothing [...] Art colleges are either obsessed with conceptual art or want you to go to Italy to study the masters (which is the kiss of death to any aspiring artist - why would you want to paint like someone did 400 years ago?) [...] Don't listen to your teachers, they don't know anything. Trust your instincts!-"

The best portraits I've ever painted ever

Before I made tiny things I used to paint. A lot.

You've seen a lot of my landscape paintings but I also used to do a lot of portraits. Infact at A level I did a whole project on portraits which I got full marks for. Boom.

So here are a few of the best portraits I've ever painted ever.

I got this painting professionally framed and it's currently hanging in my house.

I think I like the collar bone best. Is that weird?

Self portrait.

There're quite a few of these but I like this one because it's a bit different.

This is my friend Stef and I think the painting really looks like her.

This is the first version of a few paintings of my Grandma that I did for A level.

This lady lived to be 101.

Legend.

I love this fun painting of my friend Lizzi, and it was a lot of fun taking the photo to paint from.

This painting was done when we were 16/17 and she's got a lot more shoes now so maybe I should do an updated version with her entire collection.

Re-painting

I did this painting over 2 years ago when I was on my foundation course at college.

It was a development piece to practice a technique.

My work at the time was all about close up views of part of the body. This is the inside corner of the eye.

But it's a bit weird and I have no need for it any more. It's not the sort of painting I want up on the wall.

So I painted over it.

I went a little abstract and just had fun making marks with paint and pens all over it, and you can still see some of the original painting underneath which I like.

Then I painted my face on top which looks like it's coming out from all the chaos.

In other news, I've been featured on Craftzine for the first time. So exciting!

Check it out here.

Also, if any of you are Instructables users and would like a 3 month pro membership then just leave your email address in a comment and I'll send it your way.

I've only got one to give away so the first commenter gets it.

House portraits

Remember this drawing of my housemates?

Well we thought it would be fun if we each did a drawing of us all, and here they are.

This is Lucy's. She's a fine artist like me.

This is Luke's. He's a graphic designer.

And this is Ryan's. He's the one with the beard and he's studying Games Art.

The idea behind his drawing is that I'm doing one of my signature poses while the others are looking annoyed. Ha!

Embroidered faces

Have y'all seen this awesome portrait of Tim Gunn by Lucky Jackson?

Ode to Tim Gunn is a mix of paint and applique on vintage fabric. I love the mix of paint and embroidery.

The Lovelies is another cute piece by Lucky Jackson so be sure to check her out on Etsy.

These reminded me of the work of Caroline Kirton who exhibited at the arts centre where I work a few years ago.

She combines applique and free embroidery to create pieces based on teenage life.

'My Mum's a proper weirdo!'

'Do heels go with this?'

And here's my attempt at portrait embroidery if you haven't already seen it.