PAINTING DEMO IN MEXICO

February 23, 2016

On February 23 I put on a live painting demonstration in my studio at ArtVallarta.

I’ve done painting and drawing demonstrations before, but I’d never done a full-on three-hour demonstration of how to create an acrylic painting. My momentary nervousness faded as soon as I started mixing colors and painting, and I found myself thoroughly enjoying the process.

I chose a photograph from a Hawaii photo shoot with Torano in the pool of my Honolulu condo as the subject matter for my demonstration. This was a good image for my purposes because it’s a clearly defined face with strong light coming from a single direction. The less complicated the light, the easier the painting—–and with only 3 hours to complete most or all of the work, I wanted to keep it simple.

I began by mixing paint and laying in large areas of the painting loosely, to see early on how my colors were working.

My audience of painting students seemed to be delighted to be ‘let in on the secrets’ of creating a painting. They watched intently, taking notes and asking questions throughout—about the nature of acrylic paints, brushwork, composition, mixing colors, working from photographs, and much more.

In 3 hours I managed to get near completion on a lively, exciting painting, while narrating my process. Thanks to my students for sharing with me some of the photographs they shot during the demonstration.

The day after the demo, I spent a couple of hours in my studio moving the painting to completion. It’s now showing online in my Paintings Gallery. It’s called Fourth of July.