Spanish Armada

Here's my latest painting, the first of two portraits for my final project. A while ago I promised my housemate that I'd make a painting for him before we left. And with our semester about to end I figured I better hurry up and make good on it. So here it is, from the preliminary paint sketch ...


... to the final thing.

Gitano, 120 x 60 cm
Oil paint on canvas
Painted November 2009

I wanted to go for a softer, more painterly look and while I am generally pleased with the result I also feel like I've lost a lot of what made the way I've been painting recently so interesting. It just looks so ... average, I guess. Maybe that's because I'm not technically proficient enough to blow anyone away with this kind of classical approach. I think that my next painting will be a bit more gestural; hopefully a happy balance between the painterly styles I've been playing with. Below is a rough sketch that I just did on the canvas:


Not sure how "realistic" I want it to end up looking. But the image is a phone photo of my housemate rocking it out on Guitar Hero.