I recently finished a large commissioned painting and I wanted to share the process of how the piece was developed and executed.
Since it was a commissioned piece, the concept was something I discussed and worked out with the client beforehand. We talked about what she was looking for, elements she liked and might want to include, and I started from there.
The finished piece is done in oils on a birch panel, with areas of exposed wood, acrylic and ink, 36x48 inches.
Before I get into the progress shots, here’s the finished product, I was really excited to be done with it!
It's a commissioned painting, so before starting working on it, I discussed all the details with the client
I wanted to leave the raw wood of the panel exposed under the sort of swirl patterns, so the first step was to mask those areas with tape
I masked out huge areas, projected the designs over it and traced with marker, then cut out the shapes with an exacto knife
Later I gessoed the whole thing with several layers and sanded the surface smooth and sketched again to get everything in place
You can see my print-out of the reference from DeviantArt I was using when I began painting
I tend to work small areas at a time and then at the end I go back over areas that need more work
After the painting was done, I still had to take that tape off
You have no idea how badly I wanted to rip that tape off at various points during the process, it was like an itch I couldn't scratch
Then I began to outline the shapes with a thin line of acrylic just inside the painted edges
Here's the finished piece which was delivered to its new home just a few days ago
