Saturday, May 30, 2015

Commission complete!

Commissions are such a mixed bag of emotions! It's great knowing that there is a paycheck at the end and it's fantastic knowing there's somebody who's going to love the painting but it's so worrisome that that very person who it's intended for, won't. Especially in this case. A friend asked me to paint a very conceptual painting for her with birds representing her living kids and hollow birds representing the ones she miscarried. So clearly it means a lot to her. And she had an image in her head. Wanting it to be predominantly black and white, with a tree, but not too cold. The first birds I drew for her in a preliminary sketch looked kinda ... evil. Back to the drawing board. Literally. And I was afraid of the tree looking dead or barren. But the tree turned out to be the easiest part because I've painted plenty of trees. Birds, not so much. And I wanted to give each one it's own flair, representing the different personalities of her kids. I'm finally happy with it, although I cannot for the life of me get a good picture. Hope she likes it too.
Here are some details that actually show some of the variation I can't get the camera to pick up further out: 



Cross your fingers!