Another Ukrainian woman

About two-thirds of the way through yesterday's painting, I wished I had done it in watercolor—so much easier to get nuance and shadow into the flowers, and her face, being rather small, was kind of a pain in the acrylics as well. (I keep looking at that mouth—there's something wrong with the angle.)

I didn't want to make a complete do-over, though (I mostly dislike painting the same subject twice), so I found another reference photo and painted a different Ukrainian woman in traditional dress, although without the flower crown this time.

I painted this loosely with my #12 Silver "Black Velvet" brush, and did the small details with a rigger, so it stayed wet and soft. The tangled heap of necklaces came out a little messy, which felt cartoony next to the face details, so I used my Arteza felt pens to do a very little bit of shaping up of some of those. Other than that, just pencil and watercolor, and a few touches of gel pen. I used a pale wash of my favorite Daniel Smith turquoise for the background, because it granulates so nicely; otherwise, all Paul Jackson watercolors. I'm much happier with today's result.

My plan for the day was to clean up the kitchen; but wouldn't you rather have a new painting? (I'll still work on the kitchen.)

"Ukraine Woman"—pencil, watercolors, Arteza pens, gold gel pen, on Fluid 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches. Available.

Ukrainian Divochyy

I decided today to try my hand at recreating the traditional folk dress of Ukrainian girls—the Vyshyvanka (embroidered shirt) and wreath. It was almost as complicated to paint as I'm sure it is to construct, and I ended up elaborating with both Stabilo pencils and Uniball pen to pick out some of the details. I'm sure I didn't do it justice, but it was fun to try. This divochyy (maiden) was also prettier (and much less prissy-looking) in the photo than I managed to pull off, but I did my best, so I'm letting her stand.

I feel that it's cultural traditions like this that will be lost (along with so much else) should Ukraine be subsumed by Russia. Despite the odds, I'm hoping the Ukrainians can pull this off and save their democracy, their identity, their independence.

"Ukrainian Divochyy"—pencil, acrylic paints, Stabilo pencils, Uniball pen, on 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches.

If anyone would like to purchase this painting, I will donate the funds to one of the organizations sending supplies to Ukraine. Send me a message on Instagram @losangeles_melliott.

Dogs

Today I had a little commission to paint. Last time S.T.A.R.T. (which stands for Shelter Transport Animal Rescue Team) had a fundraiser, I offered to auction off a pet portrait for a donation. Someone won the item and then asked, if he paid extra would I do both of his dogs? I told him yes, and planned to get back to him with a higher price tag. He sent me reference photos, and I realized that the higher price tag was warranted; not only were the photos not great quality (and had things like half a head chopped off), but the only picture of the dogs together was with one of them lying prone on his stomach on the kitchen floor, and I wasn't going to paint a full-length dog!

I ended up picking out the two photos in which the dogs were both facing forward and looking at the owner (camera), then cutting out the dogs, scaling them so they were approximately the right size in proportion to one another (I say approximately because I only had that one photo of the two of them to go on), and pasting them into Photoshop next to each other to create a composite photo from which I could work. I'm hoping that the person doesn't mind that Bailey's tongue is hanging fully out of his mouth...but if he does, he should have sent more photos! (Plus, I love painting dog tongue, the colors are cool.)

Such is the lot of dog portrait painters. (And sometimes of human ones, too, although I haven't yet painted a picture of anyone with their tongue hanging out.)

I ended up waiting so long to get this portrait done that I decided I couldn't charge him any more for it, but at least the charity received their donation, no matter what. Here is my watercolor of Bailey and Samson. I hope their "daddy" likes it.

"Bailey Samson"—watercolors and a little gel pen on coldpress watercolor paper, 12x9 inches (with border for framing).