female cardinal w.c.

The Shiawassee Arts Center is hosting its 14th Annual Member Exhibition, lasting from April 26th 'til June 12th. This is my submission into the show. If you happen to be in Owosso within the next couple of months, be sure to visit the gallery! This framed, 5x7" watercolor painting of a female cardinal is up for sale at $60 USD. If it doesn't happen to sell while on display there, I'll make it available online afterward. Prints are available, so contact me if you're interested.

The Holy Family

Commissioned for Susan, a local lady, as a gift for her mother, she requested a portrait of the Holy Family rendered in watercolors.

For our initial meeting, I brought along a big pile of art books from my personal collection. On a whim, I also did an online search for a handful of other paintings, which I took along on my handy li'l netbook. Like the books, I felt that my client would appreciate looking over various renditions of the Holy Family to help her decide on the details. Wouldn't you know it, she decides on one of the last minute, digital images.

As it turned out, this was a good thing. She took a real shine to "The Holy Family" by Janet McKenzie, whose work I wasn't familiar with in the least. So, I did some searching around and found that I liked a lot of her work and subject matter. While I may not completely agree with the artist's beliefs, I can still appreciate the paintings' beauty and themes. (Holiness & The Feminine Spirit: the Art of Janet McKenzie is a good reference.)

After some discussion, my client and I also chose to go with a more historically accurate portrayal of the Holy Family. So instead of White, or Black like in Janet McKenzie's original, here they are Hebrew. For this aspect, I referred to the artwork of James Tissot, whose attention to accuracy humbles me. Tissot's rendering of Joseph can be seen reflected in my own. (James Tissot: The Life of Christ is another good reference.)

Having finally finished this, I'm very pleased with the result. If you would like a print of this, or commission something similar, please contact me at andrew.shirey@yahoo.com.

wedding picture w.c. painting

A friend of the family through our church has been serving in the military and was married some time back. However, because of their separate locations they decided to opt for a proxy marriage, so they weren't able to have a traditional service and ceremony. His mother wanted something memorable for the two of them as a belated wedding gift, so she commissioned this wedding picture done in watercolor. Finished just in time, too, since he arrives back in the States tonight for a brief break. I know his mother has been looking forward very much to this, especially to meet her new daughter-in-law and two (as well as her first) grandchildren.

She requested Irish scenery, thus the landscape in the background, beyond the arch. The scanner included most of the artwork, but cropped a portion off. You can note a very small part of the clovers in the bottom right corner.

tufted titmouse w.c. painting

It was my mother's birthday yesterday, so as a gift I did this small watercolor painting of a tufted titmouse for her. I haven't done much with watercolors for a while now so it felt good to do something like this, which was simple and could do within an evening.

Mom and myself with her painting

Christmas play sets

Here I am standing by the backdrop painting, hung behind the choir seats.

Each year my hometown church of Perry Baptist traditionally puts on two Christmas play programs: one with children, the other with adults. This year I was asked to assist with set designs for the children's play "Miracle on Main Street" by painting a backdrop, requesting that it be a town square with a visible church. Rarely do I work large scale like this, so even after spending nearly two weeks working on it, it only managed to be mostly complete before the deadline came. Had I a better notion of how much work would go into such an endeavor, I would have started earlier. As they say, hindsight is 20/20. Still, the painting was satisfactory for the play and afterward I put on the finishing touches, as it may have a use in future Christmas plays.

Watercolor Paintings

Of the mediums I've painted in, I've become most comfortable with watercolors. Each of my paintings started out as a light pencil drawing before applying the paint. Some were rendered directly from life, others have been created with photographic references.

These portraits were all rendered from life, that is, each person sat and posed for the duration of the painting:
























Unless you're a model, the typical person has a low tolerance for holding still for hours on end. I've found that it's useful to do an initial sketch, let the person take a break while copying the drawing onto watercolor paper, then have them resume the pose when you're ready to paint.

While using photographic references has received plenty of criticism, they are no less art than any other piece. It's like telling an inker that his job is just "tracing". Artists know what is and what is not copying. Here are three cityscapes that were made with the use of photographs:












Two of these were scenes from my hometown, the third from a neighboring town. I'm not particularly fond of rendering architecture or cityscapes, but it's hard to argue when you get the finished piece.

And here are a few more watercolors:












The first is untitled, the second is Vitruvian as the Urizen. A combination of two master works, Leonardo's Vitruvian Man and Blake's The Ancient of Days, this piece is also a combination of watercolor and acrylic. It's also come to be a rather iconic image for me, as I've used it for the basis of my current business logo. As for the third, it was for a college art project where I designed a painting around a fictitious rock band of my own creation.