This painting was begun more than five years ago. There might be a blog entry to remind me when. It got stalled because my photo references were blurry. But, the thing is, I love this image of my two youngest and decided to paint it. I didn’t imagine the likenesses would be such a chore. Other more inspiring and clear ideas called me away but now I am setting a goal to drag out the few unfinished works and aiming to solve their challenges.

I first covered the faces and other flesh areas with titanium white. This is very opaque which will take me back to a sort of blank canvas. I let it dry while I worked on sketches to get their likenesses good. Now, if you look closely, I have applied a flesh tone mixed with a transparentizer to allow many translucent layers to build up, creating a supple and realistic flesh area. Next, I used a combination of titanium, flake or lead white and a tiny amount of Naples yellow. With this mixture, I carefully sculpted areas of light that now begins to add the three dimensional shapes that will build the likenesses. As portrait artists, we must understand this. It is the way the light falls on a surface that enables us to recognize features. Both of these girls have almost finished raising their own children but I can still see them at this stage. All my girls have been a joy.