I decided that today would be the last day I would work on this copy. I'm not completely satisfied with my painting, but it's close enough, I learned a lot, and I just felt like being done. So I basically put little details in like the highlights on the eyes and some more feathers in the hat, and defined the curls of her hair. I was finished before lunch. Lots of museum visitors told me how much they liked it, and many of them asked me what I do with my copies when I'm done with them. I told them they basically pile up in my house! I've been copying since 2000, on and off, and I've done dozens of copies, having only sold two, which were both commissions. I'm copying because it's fun and a great way to learn. If a copy comes out especially good, I'll frame it and hang it on the wall, but otherwise they get stacked in my storage room.
Here is how it came out (pardon the shadow from the easel.) I feel like my figure looks a little bit slumped and more tired than the woman in David's painting, but it's very subtle.
I turned in my permit and got permission for my next copy, which will be "Lady Caroline Howard" by Sir Joshua Reynolds. I chose it because it's a figure in a landscape, which is an interest of mine, and it has more of that shiny cloth that I like painting. I hope to get a new canvas stretched in time to start on it next Thursday.
Click the images for a larger view
1 comment:
Great copy of an extremely complex painting! Really impressed with the portrait as well as the surface quality of her gown and the shawl. Beautiful light in both. Congrats!
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