"Caroline"
Pastel on Paper
425gsm, 30cm x 40cm (11⅞" x 15¾")
Those of you who are following my painting escapades regularly may have noticed my portrait of that pretty Brazilian woman I posted about 3 weeks ago. Guess who else noticed?
Ever since I painted that portrait, my darling wife Caroline (@caro-art) has been dropping little hints about it now and again, mostly in the way of fishing for compliments. The guys here who are also stricken blessed by the institution of marriage know exactly what I'm talking about. (If you don't, get help quickly, or you're in for a life of confusion and a world of pain!)
Honestly, I thought nothing of it and I had no ulterior motive in painting this chick! I was looking at this strictly as a challenge in the pursuit of learning the art of portrait painting. Being Caucasian myself, I find matching the skintones of people of color especially difficult, so the reference photo of this pretty woman was a welcome exercise, no more.
Of course, as a husband of many years and two marriages, I know better than trying to explain a simple truth to a woman! And I also knew that I had to make it up to her by painting her portrait. And it better be good on the first try!!!
Long story short, in the end, she liked her portrait and everything was coming up roses. Peace was restored to the House of Wulff once more. BTW, the stains on the painting are from the sweat off my brow. Win some, lose some...
Diejenigen von euch, die meine Mal-Eskapaden regelmäßig verfolgen, haben vielleicht das Porträt der hübschen Brasilianerin bemerkt, das ich vor etwa 3 Wochen gepostet habe. Ratet mal, wem das noch aufgefallen ist?
Seit ich dieses Porträt gemalt habe, macht mein geliebtes Weib Caroline (@caro-art) diesbezüglich immer wieder so klitzekleine Andeutungen, und ich merke, sie möchte gerne ein Kompliment hören. Die Herren der Schöpfung, die auch mit der Institution der Ehe gestraft gesegnet sind, wissen genau, wovon ich rede. (Wenn nicht, solltet ihr euch ganz schnell um Hilfe bemühen, sonst droht euch ein Leben voller Verwirrung und eine Welt voller Schmerzen!)
Als ich diese Tussi malte, habe ich mir nichts dabei gedacht, und ich hatte keine Hintergedanken, ehrlich! Als Student der Porträtmalerei betrachtete ich das Ganze als eine Herausforderung. Da ich selbst ein alter weißer Mann bin, finde ich es besonders schwierig, die Hauttöne farbiger Menschen zu treffen, also war das Referenzfoto dieser hübschen Frau eine willkommene Übung, mehr nicht.
Als langjähriger Ehemann (zwei Ehen!) ist mir aber durchaus klar, dass es sinnlos ist, einer Frau einfache Wahrheiten zu erklären! Und ich wusste auch, dass ich das jetzt wiedergutmachen musste, indem ich ihr Porträt malte. Und wehe es gelänge nicht gleich beim ersten Anlauf!!!
Lange Rede, kurzer Sinn: Am Ende gefiel ihr das Porträt, und alles ist wieder gut. Der Haussegen im Hause Wulff ist wieder im Blei. Die Flecken auf dem Gemälde stammen übrigens vom Schweiße meiner Stirn. Ein bisschen Verlust hat man immer...
Thanks for looking, and please don't forget to upvote and reblog if you liked my art. Also, visit my NFT Showroom Gallery if you're interested in collecting NFTs of my paintings. Until next time!
Danke fürs Anschauen, und vergesst bitte nicht das Upvoten und Rebloggen, wenn euch mein Beitrag gefallen hat. Besucht auch meine NFT Showroom Gallery, wenn ihr NFTs meiner Bilder sammeln möchtet. Bis zum nächsten Mal!
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Bravo Folker this is the best way to grace you the lady and not to wash your socks and underwear.
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Thanks Armando. Yes, I heard about that conversation :-)
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That's an excellent portrait. Very realistic. There was a lot riding on that painting and I'm sure a lot of pressure. But you pulled it off amazingly. Ive never seen your wife in person but I think you did her justice. Nice one!
Thank you Dane and Happy New Year. Yes, that's her to a tee. The likeness is perfect, the technique could use some work. There was no pressure, that was just a vehicle for the story that could have been. She's the sweetest thing and not a jealous bone in her body.
And now let's sing "There's no business like show business!" :-)
That's good to hear.
Happy new year to you and your wife as well. 😁
Eine Weisheit die auch 2022 Gültigkeit hat und schon immer Gültigkeit hatte.
Euch ein gutes Neues
Dankeschön, und auch dir ein gutes neues Jahr.
Ist ja interessant! Ich habe @caro-art auch in meiner Autovoter-Liste. Also habe ich Euch im Doppelpack.
Ihr bringt konstant hohe künstlerische Qualität, und das gefällt mir. Schöne Grüße an Caro.
Danke dir! "Doppelpack" ist gut :-) Wir wissen die Autovotes zu schätzen und freuen uns über jeden, der sich die Bilder anschaut und auch mal kommentiert. Ich werde die Grüße ausrichten.
Nicht notwendig. Mention ist gerade erschienen :) Trotzdem vielen Dank fuer die Gruesse.
The portrait of your wife is very well done, she has a kind smile. Pastel chalk as a medium is still foreign to me, even though I bought it once but haven’t used it yet.
It's a cheap one for children I think, lacks deep, dark colors. Maybe I'll try it on dark paper.
Thank you. Haven't done too many portraits, maybe a dozen or so. Still practicing.
Children's chalk is not pastel, too coarse, too bleak. Sounds like you got a hold of Van Bleiswijk, the rock bottom discount brand of Talens Amsterdam. Square shape, relatively hard.
If you want excellent pastels on a budget I can recommend Toison d'or by Koh-I-Noor Hardtmuth, a Czech company. 72 colors about 70 EUR. If you buy cheaper, you'll buy twice.
However, almost more important is the paper. Regular paper doesn't take enough layers, and dark regular paper makes it worse since you can't get your highlights in. Bare minimum is an ingres paper. The best paper is Pastelmat by Clairefontaine, however, it's VERY expensive (3-4 EUR for 1 30x40 sheet) and watercolor underpaintings bleed too much.
I like using Liquitex Clear Gesso over watercolor paper. This gesso is the only one with just the right amount of absorbent grit. Accepts all waterbased media w/o bleeding and the gritty, almost sanded texture allows multiple layers of pastel. Since it's clear it can be applied OVER the underpainting or selectively only in certain areas. The pigment color payoff with this gesso is unbelievable! It also works extremely well with colored pencils. Rich colors all the way around.
That's OK, children in poor families will be happy for them. I've bought them in Lidl for 10 Euros.
I know that Czech brand, my son used it when he was 10 years old, but that had only 6 colors. If i have more money, I will also buy a larger set and paper. For now, i only use watercolors and acrylic that I love.
Gesso? A great idea! My watercolor instructor, Lami said I could even paint on canvas, after i prepared it with gesso.
I think i have to start producing NFTs (half traditional, half digital) now and bringing them to market, at a not-so-high price for now. This, in turn, requires some HIVE balance in the NFT Showroom (well, i always power up 100% until my HP grows to 1000). Even if my NFT sales only cover my material costs, it’s already worth it to me!
Only the Liquitex Clear Gesso has the right grit to work with pastel. I'm sure there are one or two others, but this one is CLEAR. Regular gessos are rather smooth and not very suitable for watercolor. You need to find the right one for that.
It can't hurt to try the NFTs but I haven't had much luck with them, so don't expect too much. There is simply too much amazing competition ;-) Check your account on HiveEngine: You may already have enough tokens to sell for a few Swap.Hive on the NFT Showroom!
https://hive-engine.com/
However I think you're better off just posting your art slow and steady until you build a loyal following. It takes time; Hive is a marathon, not a sprint. Look at some artists here, they can pretty much write their own check just by publishing in OnChainArt. And if you look at their accounts, you'll find this didn't happen overnight :-)
Thanks for your help! As I see it, people here are very helpful and happy to share their knowledge. In Hungary, especially among professional artists, this is unfortunately not typical, they are jealous of their secrets and often do not value each other's work. I don't want to be one of those people. The atmosphere is different in the company of amateur artists, but there is even a lack of constructive criticism and praise for shoddy works. For N F T (and whatever), I think the most important thing is a good idea, which can be either funny or astonishing, related to the problems of the world, etc. I find that my natural watercolor stuff (for example birds, flowers), which I often work on for days, doesn’t hit the stimulus threshold, but some of my abstract scribbles do it.
Yes, that's possible. You won't know until you try it. Just don't waste a lot of money minting 100 NFTs just to get stuck. Try it slowly. Good luck!
What a fabulous painting. She will definitely love it!
Thank you. She did. I'm glad you like it, too. :-)
You are welcome.
Beautiful :)
Thank you :-)
You are always amaze us with your charming drawings, Im sure your wife is proud of you.
Btw, I thought you were a young man in your twenties. 😆
Good luck. ❤️
Thank you.
I'm thinking that, too, and then my bones tell me otherwise :-) Nope, I'm an old geezer in my sixties. I just started painting late in life, in 2019.
The important thing is to keep the spirit of youth within you. ❤️
I wish a good and a happy long life to you and your beautiful wife ♥️