Grandpa Elliott

Grandpa Elliott

A3

Coloured pencils on mat board

The reference photo for this portrait was taken 17 years ago by my brother, when he and his wife were on their honeymoon in New Orleans, when Grandpa Elliott was a little known busker on the streets. Now, because of utube, he has become a legendary and much sought after street entertainer. Please take the time to browse some of the many videos on utube featuring this charming and endearing character and I'm sure you'll come away with a smile on your face and feel better about the world!!! :)

Joy

Joy

8x11 inches

Coloured Pencils and solvent on Pastelmat

I entitled this artwork Joy for two reasons - the look of sheer glee on the face of my little neice Bailey and the absolute joy I had working on this portrait, I am definitely a fan of working with the Zest-it on the Pastelmat. It enabled me to get a lovely smooth canvas of skin in a relatively short time frame, and also smoothed out the texture of the Pastelmat, allowing me to add nice crisp details where they were needed. The only aspect I struggled with, was waiting for the paper to dry between applications of solvent before doing more pencil work - patience is not one of my virtues, but I think it did pay off in the end! :)

Face of Symmetry completed

Face of Symmetry

A4

Coloured pencils on Pastelmat

Here she is all finished. Fortunately I scanned it before applying fixative. Much of the colour did sink and darken with the fixative once I applied it, and even though I have touched it up quite a bit, the earlier scan was better - so lesson learnt - no fixative in future!!!