A Portrait Sketch of Aíne

Here's a portrait study I did of our model Aíne in the life class recently.

Although sorely tempted, I held back from laying in the darker tones in her face, and adding detail in her eyes.
Again I was trying to stop myself from being too specific in my descriptiveness. Hopefully the result is a little more subtle and nuanced than it might have been.
You can see a bunch more of these portrait sketches on my Facebook page.

A Study of Declan Revisited

The life painting I did of Declan recently was one that I nearly liked and I didn't quite know why. So I went back to it and did a bit more work simplifying the background and loosing a few edges.
I was fairly pleased with the result and then I happened to look at it without my glasses. (See my Photoshop approximation below)


It had a good deal of truth and accuracy in the tonal values and colouring that were obscured by the detail that I could see with my spex on.
This is something of the effect that I am trying to achieve when I use my big blender brush to soften the edges that I am so often inclined to over emphasize.
Being able to look at your work like this is probably the only advantage to being short-sighted.

Illustrators Ireland's Website Makeover

Speaking of the IGI, the Illustrators Ireland website has had a very nice makeover courtesy of our web officer Stephen Synnott.
Great job Stephen.

The King of Ireland's Son in the United Arts Club

Many thanks to Laureate na nÓg, Siobhán Parkinson who gave a wonderful speech at last night's launch of the IGI exhibition at the United Arts Club.
And hats off again to Brian Gallagher for putting the whole show together.

This illustration from The King of Ireland's Son by Brendan Behan is one of the two paintings that I have in the exhibition.
It's nice to have a picture from this book in the show, as Behan spent quite a bit of time in the bar of the United Arts Club himself.

IGI Exhibition at The United Arts Club.

Thursday the 26th sees the opening of a show of original illustrations by myself and other members of the IGI.
There will be work there by Niamh Sharkey, Chris Judge, Adrienne Geoghegan, and many others.
We each submitted two pieces.
It's at the United Arts Club in Dublin at 8pm.
Come along if you are in the area.

Studies of Sean and Declan

Here are a couple of recent studies from the life room.
Each one measures 30 x 40 cm.
Sean above and Declan with the ponytail.
I've just come across this super drawing that one of my life room buddies, Conor Walton did of Declan on the same afternoon.
You can see a bunch of Conor's excellent life drawings on his facebook page.

The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey: The Musical

Did I say there would be no more posts about Christmas?
Sorry, here is the last one, honestly.
Thanks to Marion for sending me this link to a video showing that there was a musical version of The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey, at the Provision Theater, Chicago.


This is one of my paintings from the book
and below is a photo from a stage play of the book that showed somewhere in the USA last Christmas.


You'd think they would let me know about these things.
After all I have effectively done their costume, set design and art direction.

Some Sketches of Grace

These are some recent studies I made of Grace.
Each one took one and a half to two hours.

Culture File Interview

This is definitely my last post about Christmas till next December...I promise.
Here's a link to an interview I did with Regan Hutchins of Lyric FM's Culture File.
Regan and I had a nice chat about the Golden Age of Illustration, and about creating images for Dickens' spectres of Christmas Future.

A Portrait Sketch of Michael McWilliams

It was nice to get into the studio and to get back into work after all of the Christmas festivities.
A long time drawing buddy, artist Michael McWilliams, modelled for one of my two hour portrait sketches.
I've long wanted to paint Michael for his characterful face and his striking colouring.
He was a great sitter too, and although I still have to sort out the lighting set-up in the studio, I was pretty pleased with the result.