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Grand Prize 1st Place Winner 2009~
North Light Book Club Cover Competition

Portrait of Linda Ahearn
24" x 18", Acrylic
by Allison Alexandra

One. Attire

At Linda’s studio, we first talked over what she might wear. I liked her lively red robe with a circular orange design. It appeared to enhance her skin tone and hair color.

The robe alone seemed incomplete. I asked if she might wear it with her black shirt. Now, I had a feeling this was a great combination. Her dress looked very striking and elegant.

Her sitting with her eyes down was stunning. I do not usually paint portraits with the eyes down. However, there was a certain "poetry" to this gesture and expression which moved me.

Two. Sketch

On an 18 x 24 canvas, I sketched lightly a basic half-length portrait of Linda with charcoal pencil. I like charcoal pencil in that it is flexible, easy to erase, and paint over.

The purpose is to set up a basic composition or “map” of the gesture, proportions, shadows, and clothing to begin a basic lay-in of values and colors. This is the foundation, so it is an important step in the process of painting a portrait.

Three. Background

Typically, it is helpful to start with the background color. This portrait was done with Soft Body Acrylics. In this case, I opted for a dark tone of Pthalo green and Alizarin Crimson mix with a large flat brush like #32.

The background will wind up with many coats, so it is not necessary to perfect the paint application the first time around. I sprayed with a water bottle around the edges of the figure to keep a nice soft edge.

Four. Initial Block-in

The details are not essential at this point. In this stage, I concentrate on just putting paint on the canvas, including basic lights, darks, transitions, and hues. I use a #12 filbert and a #2 flat for smaller work.

It seems useful to leave the lightest lights and darkest darks for a later stage. This stage often has an undone look at this point, but this is
not permanent.

Five-A. Modeling the Head and Hands

First, the overall skin tone appeared light. I made adjustments to darken the skin tone and shadows, remembering to keep the face tone lighter than the arms for it is closest to the light.

At this point, I spent a considerable amount of time modeling the head with light and shadow. The hands are developed somewhat but not complete yet.

Often, I find for a simple Caucasian skin tone, the combination of titanium white with small amounts of Napthol Red Light and Naples Yellow work well. A little Burnt Sienna and Burnt Umber and Mars Black may be added for shadow areas.

In this stage, the darks of the background, shirts, and pants were given another dark value coat. Dioxazine Purple and a little Napthol Red Light are added to the background for unity.

Six. Clothing

In the next stage, I spent time developing the clothing. Part of the trick here was working to keep the shoulders in balance throughout the painting. Her robe involved an intricate batik pattern. I opted to keep it a strong red (Cadmium Medium Red Hue) by the end, which I felt offered a more striking and less cloudy appearance.

Seven. Finishing Touches

This is the time to make sure all the parts of the painting are working together well and reveal a harmonious unity. I step back throughout and check the progress at a distance.

For the last stage, I repaint certain areas to accentuate the overhead lighting hitting the shoulders, tops of legs, arms, and certain key areas of the folds, and the orange design. More time is spent developing and resolving the hands and arms.

Originally, I had a plan to do just a Head & Shoulders of Linda Ahearn. However, after the initial consultation, I was amazed at how the poses with the hands appeared so much better and more complete. The hands are part of the secondary strength of the portrait in that as a sculptor, her hands are integral to some of her work.

Here is a good example of having an intention but still staying open-minded about other options. I learned that a portrait can emerge, rather than be controlled. As a result, this subject and many other viewers commented on what a wonderful addtion the strong, quiet hands were to the head. In fact, at one point, it seemed like the hands
painted themselves.

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