Keli reads from a book of sonnets. William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 18" could have been written for her:
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest;
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
This is one of my favorite paintings. My beautiful model spent quite a little while in the pool, posing for me in her long gown. She took this shell from the side of the pool and listened to it with no direction, proving to me once again that, while good art often requires much orchestration, sometimes it is simply recognizing a beautiful composition when you see it!
In real life, my model is a competitive swimmer and a lifeguard, born in Hawaii and thus no stranger to water. To me, she is Ariel, Daughter of King Triton and Queen Athena, communing with one of her subjects.
This painting is 20x16 oil on linen~ I hope you like it.
Keli, my model and sweet young friend, is the subject of this painting. She is an athlete who loves to read and who never wears a dress. To pose her in a dress with a parasol is funny only to us because we know who she is. She is also a romantic and lovely woman, though she hasn't fully embraced this aspect of herself. I see it, and she sees it when she looks at paintings I've done of her. It has been a joy exploring the potential of ourselves in this series of parasol paintings.
This piece, 24x18 oil on linen (like the painting below), framed in gold, is in the International Museum of Contemporary Masters of Fine Art and is currently in the 2012 Salon International hosted by Greenhouse Gallery in San Antonio, Texas.
This is Chelsea, one of my favorite models. I met her at the Salon International in 2011 and she began modelling for me shortly afterward. This painting of her is in the International Museum of Contemporary Masters of Fine Art and is currently in the 2012 Salon International (see banner below), the very locale of our first meeting!
It is a profound blessing to be able to spend time with such a beautiful person, working together to try to create something that is also beautiful.
The concept of this painting was light temperature and the pose explores line. The contour on the left side of the figure is one long, graceful line. The complement of this, on the right side of the figure, is the quick and active line of the parasol points and the tops of the model's hands. The color scheme is also complementary: red and green. This yin and yang energizes an otherwise quiet composition and hopefully excites and satisfies the viewer at the same time.
Thank you for stopping by!
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Keli reads from a book of sonnets. William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 18" could have been written for her:
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