Painting a Day - Week 3

This week, my painting focus will be a self-portrait series influenced by Picasso. As I have only attempted to paint a self-portrait once in my life using acrylic paint years ago, this will push me to get more comfortable with painting portraits.

Inspiration:

Upon researching self-portrait painting series, I came across a collection of Picasso paintings on the following website: https://mymodernmet.com/pablo-picasso-self-portraits/

These works by Picasso mark his journey as an artist as his personal style developed overtime between the age of 15 and 90 years old. The following photos display a few portraiture styles of his that I will look to imitate in my own practice this week.

20 years old (1901)

25 years old (1907)

56 years old (1938)

90 years old (June 28, 1972)

My Works:

First Attempt (left) .... that made for a great underpainting to the second attempt (right) :) Based on Picasso's 1901 self-portrait

Second work inspired by Picasso's 1907 self-portrait

Third take based on Picasso's painting from 1938

Fourth painting inspired by Picasso's 1972 self-portrait

Reflection:

This week was a good challenge for me since I've not been successful with creating self-portraits previously due to my limited experience in attempting them. Working to paint small scale self-portraits then, while using larger brushes (this was all I had available at the time) was an additional challenge that stretched me and my patience throughout the process.

Painting 1 -

My first try painting a self-portrait this week did not go too well. I left a very small part of the composition available for me to try detailed brush strokes within my face and struggled big time. In addition, I strayed away from Picasso's primarily blue and white color scheme of his first portrait that I was taking inspiration from. Additional colors I subconsciously tried to work in did not help it in any way, and after reviewing the painting the next day I decided it would be best to re-work it while enlarging my portrait scale.

Take two was improved in a number of ways. The larger scale and simplified color palette felt much more effective although I still struggled with proportions - that is something I would have loved to do over and over again until this felt realistic, but I didn't want to go over my 60 minute challenging time frame, so this is as far as I got!

Painting 2 -

To begin with, the proportionate/accuracy part of this painting isn't much of a factor. The ways in which this piece felt more successful however, was better emulating Picasso's color palette and thinned-out painterly style. Although the colors I used in painting my face became much more differentiated than in Picasso's, the overall color scheme of the painting was a good exercise for me in limiting myself to more earth-toned paints rather than the whole rainbow which I've used plenty in previous paintings.

Painting 3 -

Going into paintings three and four this week were a bit more intimidating as I truly launched into Picasso's cubism portrait style. For this work, I tried to focus on line within the composition as color wasn't something I had to consider as much. Picasso's hazy effect around some of his lines in his self-portrait led me to attempt some thinned out paint and see what drips would do. Although differing from his style, the drips added something to this painting that I felt was needed.

Painting 4 -

I was a little lost starting out with this painting. Picasso's designs and lines incorporated within his 1972 self-portrait were slightly daunting for me as it's not my conventional style to say the least. I decided to begin with an underpainting and jump right in with some colorful lines. As I'm not sure what medium this Picasso self-portrait was in, I didn't know how to imitate some of his dark, thin and short lines in my hour long paint session with a thick brush and wet paint that didn't allow me to successfully recreate some of the sketched out looking lines of Picasso's work.

Overall -

Painting self-portraits this week pushed me. Oil paint was an unfamiliar medium for me to do self-portraits with in the first place, and attempting Picasso's cubist style was definitely an added challenge. I enjoyed getting to apply new painting techniques this week while working in such a unique style!