This is Annie, the horse, without Charlotte, on a Harris Moore linen fine weave canvas. I started by sketching Annie's head from various angles to work out a pleasing composition before ordering a bespoke canvas. This I primed with gesso and acrylic, adding colour to create a dark background as I decided it would work better to paint oils getting lighter rather than starting from a white canvas. I sketched the horse's head in white and mixed up some greys using Payne's grey, raw umber and Prussian blue for the shadows. The whole head was blocked in and left to dry before building up more layers of glazing. The background was changed to blue at the same time Prussian blue was painted into the shadows to give depth - it acts as a complementary colour to the underpainting. I was planning to change it again but at the moment I quite like the blue. I am working on this at the same time as the portrait of both Annie and Charlotte to allow for drying times, which is quite handy!
Charlotte & Annie - a portrait in acrylics
This latest commission is from a customer whose dog I painted years ago. They now want a portrait of their daughter with her horse, and one just of the horse for their daughter. I loved the photo they sent me of Charlotte and Annie so while waiting for the bigger canvas to arrive for the horse I started on the smaller painting which is 9x12" in acrylic. I painted the background a warm black and then drew the information I needed when the surface had dried. Next I started to block in the colours and main areas of light and dark. I chose a fairly small brush to start with as I didn't want to skew the details so the glazes have been built on little by little in order to build up the colour and lose the black - I wanted to make them 'appear' from the darkness. Then I worked more on the horse's head, adding details like freckles (if horses have freckles?!) and started to build glazes on Charlotte's face. I have kept going back and adding different glazes over the last few weeks, as I think I've finished it, and then when I look at it again, I've noticed something else. The last picture shows how I have softened the shadows a tiny fraction and warmed up Charlotte's hair a bit, plus I've changed her mouth shape a little, changed the tones on the horse and added a few more hairs to the horse's nose. Will I still find changes when I look again tomorrow....?!!