Large Commissions
This blog post is about my largest canvas commission to date: a chimpanzee.
Siobhan Guthrie
8/18/20263 min read
My latest commission has taken me to new canvas dimensions! I have slowly been offering snippets of this work in progress from the under drawing in 'Correcting Perspectives' to how I built up layers by smudging the paint with my fingers in 'Beyond the Brush' . Here I am talking in depth about this work from idea to completion. I hope you enjoy reading about my creative process.
Taking a total of twenty hours to complete, this 60cm by 80cm commission was the largest canvas I have worked on to date. When I was commissioned to paint a chimpanzee for someone who loves this mammal I was thrilled that they wanted a painting to cover a significant proportion of their living room wall.
However, when I began the under drawing, I realised the scale I had agreed to work on was going to take some getting used to compared with the much smaller paintings that I have created in the past.
After the under drawing was complete, I began painting in some basic block colours for the background, in addition to watered down acrylic paint for my under painting of the chimpanzee itself. Next I started to add more layers of paint to the eyes. You can read more about why I paint the eyes first in my animal portraits in my Painting Eyes blog post.
I wanted the two tree branches that the chimpanzee peers through to be slightly out of focus in order for the animal to still be the centre of the picture. To do this I painted several layers: darker hues first with lighter on the top, to subtly emphasise the marks on the tree, the trees age and the shadows that the animal's presence creates. Sometimes I painted wet in wet to blend and sometimes I painted wet on dry especially to add highlights. Later, as some final details on the tree branches I, added some small dots of white, green and brown pigment to build up layers of lichen on the right hand tree branch.
Then it was a case of studying the subject very closely and again building up layers from my under painting. I used my fingers a lot to blend the pigments around the eyes to create shadows before moving on to paint in the finer details like wrinkles, highlights, and tiny hairs above the brow and around the chin. The nostrils were the most difficult part to paint, purely for getting the position and angle right as well as the direction and the shadows. It took several attempts! The beauty of acrylics though is that you can gesso over and start again! If I feel that I can do something better, I always challenge myself to have another go.
Building layers of fur required me to use my angle brush which I do tend to lean toward when painting any fur. This is because its angled tip allows you to paint thick to thin brushstrokes or vice versa if you direct the brush on the canvas in the opposite direction. In doing this I was able to go in with a thin round tip and accentuate some of those initial brush strokes to make the fur look wispy. It is important to paint the fur in different directions in order to imitate a fluffy, disheveled look. Some of these brushstrokes hang over the branch to give the impression of the chimpanzee being three dimensional on the flat canvas surface.
For me, at the later stage of painting it became about adding those highlights, improving or altering areas slightly and building on the very fine last minute details. In doing so I found myself becoming more critical of my work which I believe has ultimately led to a better final outcome. However, I have learnt went to leave the work well alone because sometimes you can end up ruining a painting by going over and over something. In truth there are what I would consider mistakes in the painting, aspects that are not quite true to the photograph, some of these are intentional, some I felt I could not or did not want to do anything further about. These are ultimately things I would consider when commissioned to complete a large painting again.
The final stage of any of my acrylic paintings is to let the paint dry for a good week. In this extremely hot weather it dried fairly instantly. This is something to factor in if you are painting during heat waves! I always leave a week before adding a layer of acrylic varnish. This seals in the painting and offers a little protection from dust and grime. I also find that it enhances some of the pigments, offers a bright, fresh appearance for the customer and a final sense of completion for myself as the artist.
Overall, I really enjoyed this painting challenge. It has stretched me in many ways and I feel proud of what I have achieved as I spent many hours painting it. As you can see in the last photo below, it is now pride of place on the customer's living room wall.
You can read the customer's review here!
Contact
If you have any questions about my creative processes or wish to commission a work please contact me. If you would like to commission a pet portrait, please write your pet's name/s in the subject line of the email along with a photograph for me to work from.
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