Nemesis

Nemesis, thy name is Kirsti. As in, "the inescapable agent of someone's or something's downfall." In this case, mine. I keep trying to paint you, but somehow I never quite capture your apparently indefinable essence.

The first time, it was your birthday and I wanted to surprise you with a sketch. You were surprised; but it wasn't exactly positive, because no matter how hard I worked at capturing your expression, you ended up looking slightly, well, mental. Something about that tall forehead, and your eyes seeming a tiny bit crossways...

Today I decided to give it another try. You sent me a photo of you reading a favorite book, and even narrated a touching story to go with it, and I thought, Here's my chance to redeem the birthday photo! So I drew slowly, and I painted carefully, and I tried hard for a likeness and...I managed to paint a pretty picture of a girl reading, but somehow, she just isn't YOU reading.

The eyes are, once again, too close together, and possible too small; the nose is a touch too long, the lips a tad too lush.... I worked it, I played with it, I introduced and took out shadows, added more eye makeup, and...

Here is "Not Quite Kirsti," today's rendering for the "People reading" series. Maybe I will have to wait until you are old and wrinkly to get it?

Uniball pen, watercolors, Bee sketchbook.

People reading

I had really intended my "people reading" collection to consist of more generic pix, meaning an unspecified person in a bookish environment perusing an unnamed novel, like my girl in the wing chair from a few posts ago. It's hard to find models for these things, though, so two days ago I posted a notice on my Facebook page asking my friends and relations to send me pix of them reading.

What I ended up with was a bunch of head shots with people holding up specific books, and in some of them people were looking at the camera, not at the book. So I revised my directions to say Hey, give me context—a chair, a table, a lamp, a cup of tea—and look at the BOOK like you're actually reading it. No results yet, but in the meantime I decided, despite my initial plans, to go with a portrait of a "real" (i.e., named and recognizable) person reading a specific book.

This is Michael, with whom I worked back in the 1980s at The Advocate. I reconnected with him on Facebook through the agency of our mutual friend, Susan, and he has since been so complimentary about all my artwork, I decided to make him the subject.

I had big fun with this—I love his astounded expression as he reads his book (which is Clavell's Gai-Jin, sequel to Tai-Pan, title not included in the photo), and capturing his ice-blue eyes and the small details of the book cover. Thanks for the reference photo, Michael!

Perhaps I will intersperse more "real" and "specific" people and books in with my "scenes." These are fun!

Uniball pen, watercolor, Bee sketchbook.