portrait stage 7

Changed the centre leg again, added detail to the wicker, added the flowers, added a warm glaze to the model's face. Almost done. At this point I'll let it sit a while before adding the final touches.

portrait stage 6

Added the floral pattern of the divan's surface. Changed the position of the centre divan leg. Added pattern to the drapery. Changed the model's hair.

portrait stage 5

Noticed that her right hand was way too big and fixed it. Worked on the drapery and the wicker frame.

portrait stage 4

Added shading, worked on the hands, fixed the perspective on the divan. Added white undercoat on the divan's surface.

portrait stage 3

Added skin tones and started on the drapery. Spent lots of time on the face. Changed the face position a little to make it less profile.

portrait stage 2

I blocked in the background with sap green, lemon yellow and payne's gray.

portrait stage 1

I began by sketching the model in charcoal directly on to the canvas, paying lots of attention to the face. I had previously taken lots of photos of her in her pose in the garden.

Primavera

Primavera 48" by 36" oil, 1997/2008, $900.

This painting came from a life painting session. It's a pretty good likeness of the model's face. Later, I added hair a la Botticelli (with maybe a little Dali) so that she could be displayed without all the "naked baggage" that goes along with a full-frontal female nude.

La Fiorentina

la Fiorentina, oil on linen on board, 2000, $3,000.

I worked on this painting while I was living in Florence. I was working with Richard Serrin, an American painter who lives there, and who is an expert in Rembrandt's techniques. I started with a pencil drawing of the model, which took about six hours. The I plotted the outline of the drawing onto the support, which was linen on board. Then the painting was done in monochrome - raw umber and lead white.

After taking several weeks just working on the monochrome painting, I was allowed to start putting the colour on. The palette consisted of burnt umber, raw umber, vermillion, and lead white powdered pigments mixed with boiled linseed oil. Colour was applied in minute porportions.

I added an imaginary snake jewel on her headscarf to refer to the model's name, which was Cleopatra.

Yuliya

Yuliya, oil, 30" by 28", 2004, commission.

I started this painting by sketching the model from life directly on to the canvas. I then took several photos of her in her pose along with shots of her collection of oriental carpets and cushions. I added the carpet designs into the background and completed the piece in my studio.