Good Artists are Observant

Before I delve into today’s post let me state my caveat: I’ll be using my painting as an example to avoid copyright issues and no I'm not being conceited.

I’ve already mentioned this painting in a previous post and for those of you who are curious to know how I came up with this I’ll be going in depth about my creative thought process.

Let’s start with the reason why I painted Betsy Ross. Normally I wouldn’t make patriotic artwork but this was for the Congressional Art Competition run by participating congressmen. I had to submit my artwork to my representative Daniel Webster. This contest was for high school students and participants compete within their district, and the grand prize was two free plane tickets to Washington, D.C., an awards ceremony, and getting my art displayed for one year under the Capitol in Cannon Tunnel.

After hearing wind of this contest, I didn’t get started on it until about two weeks later when the deadline was almost due because I was stumped for ideas. I had to follow the theme that my representative wanted which was “Historical Moments in American History." So I brainstormed ideas like doing a portrait of the Founders or depicting a battlefield, but I decided against those because it would’ve been too difficult and time consuming especially with the deadline I was facing. Then another idea popped into my head: women in U.S. history are underrepresented so why not do a portrait of Betsy Ross? It’ll be simpler and slightly easier to paint.

Excited with my vision, I set to work immediately and scrounged around Google images for reference photos of period accurate clothing and flag. After that was settled, I bought a flag from Walmart and used myself as a model pretending to sew. I have to thank my dad big time for this step because he helped me take photos of myself. It was absolutely necessary that I posed for my own reference photos because I was very particular about the position of the hands.

Once the references were gathered, I began the preliminary sketches. This third step took me two days to complete and it was a learning experience because I was having trouble with the right hand and facial proportions, which turned out to be slightly too big and out of perspective, respectively. Therefore, another sketch was made with the proper proportions. After I was satisfied with the sketches I scanned it into my computer then projected it onto the canvas. Why? Because I was severely pressed for time and at this stage I had about two more days until the deadline. Thus, the need to use a projector and trace my drawing onto the canvas. Basically, I was copying myself so it’s not cheating, it’s working smart.

The final step was putting paint to canvas, and at this point I had maybe a day and a half to complete. Needless to say I was getting close to panicking and I started to have second thoughts about doing this in oil. Oh and not to mention this was my first time working with oil paints so no pressure. Here is where everything starts to come together and I began by mixing my palette. I’m not going into details about what colors I used because that’s my trade secret. The next step I took was painting in the darker areas first, like shadows, then medium tones, the lighter tones, and finally the highlights. I tried to keep the painting as simple as possible without being too boring, so I opted for a plain background that way attention won’t be drawn away from the subject. Originally I had thoughts about adding a table for the flag to rest on, but I later ruled against it for two reasons: it would distract the viewer and it took too much time. By the time I was done painting it was about 2 am, I stayed up for almost 24 hours and I had to wake up for school in 3 hours. So I was pretty exhausted when I turned in the painting to my art teacher, and I remember having to put it in a box because it was still very wet. Oil can take up to 6 months to completely dry!

It was all worth it in the end because I won grand prize and the winners were announced on my birthday, so it was a pleasant surprise. For those of you who are still wondering how I was successful in my first oil painting, there’s not much to it other than solid drawing skills and a VERY observant eye. By this I mean taking note of every technical detail instead of just aesthetic details, you can admire your work later. The things I looked out for were proportion, contrast (light against dark and vice versa), knowing what edges to soften in order to give the illusion of perspective, and of course a decent knowledge of the color wheel. I’ve learned from other artists that shadows can be painted a grayish purple instead of just black or plain gray, and that white should have multiple colors and give the illusion of white. Being observant and paying attention to detail is key to becoming a successful artist, and anything you’re trying to accomplish in life.

With Congressman Daniel Webster

A view of Cannon Tunnel