An Informal History of the Male Nude

This is a triple study I did of Giuseppe, one of my favourite models.

For those of us who have a passion for life drawing, "The Essay" on Radio 4 this week promises to be very interesting.
The first episode featuring Edith Hall , examines the ideals of the Greeks and the Romans.

A First Try-Out for Melisande

I've had cause recently to go through my archive of original illustrations.
That word "archive" makes it sound a lot more neatly organized than it actually is I'm afraid.
I came across this painting which was my first effort at illustrating Melisande.
It appears that I was setting the book back in medieval times, but I am glad that when I really got into the process I updated the costumes a bit.
I still like this one though, and I am surprised that the composition didn't get used in the book somewhere.

A Study of Alicia in Five Steps

Here are a series of shots showing my process in painting a two and a half hour study of Alicia.
She is a new model to me and I am very much looking forward to painting her again.

Dickens Exhibition in Bologna

Happy Birthday Charles Dickens!
OK it was yesterday, but I don't think he'll notice, he's two hundred after all.
This is a picture from the only Dickens book
I have illustrated, A Christmas Carol.
I am just packing the original of this and a bunch of others to send to Bologna for the big Dickens exhibition they are having during the Book Fair this year.
The exhibition is in the Casa Saraceni.
Sorry this post is sort of about Christmas again, but I have selected a very un-Christmassy image.

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.