Day 1 Almost There!
Final stages of the large portraits. The main areas to address are the detail around the eyes and to add more life and texture to the flatter areas of tone in order to create volume in the portrait. Finally there are key areas already plotted out for the cardboard to be torn away to reveal the under layers of the board.
Day 2 I Did It!!
All the final stages were navigated successfully and I was satisfied with the overall look of the painting. I regard it as a success and i definitely tackled the second large work with much more confidence. Particularly pleasing were the torn areas. From a distance the torn areas contribute another tone and closer up they reveal texture and provide a sculptural quality.
The work of Vhils was very much in my mind when conceiving these works, the concept of portraying ordinary people as iconic and monumental is very important to me and to this artist. I am sure I have quoted Vhils before, but I don’t mind repeating and emphasising his words.
“The majority of portraits I’ve created in this Scratching the Surface series have been based on anonymous, unknown people – people not even I know. I value the idea of turning ordinary people into icons, to contrast this with the need people seem to have of creating icons in the first place. Instead of creating icons out of people who have changed history or are celebrities of some sort, like what Warhol was doing with Mao Zedong, Marilyn and others, I take an ordinary person and try and make other people think about themselves reflected in this person, who is also struggling to get by in this day and age. There is an untapped source of wealth in the individual, the unknown everyday heroes we all are in the massive struggle of life.”
http://laist.com/2011/11/10/interview_with_vhils.php
