Bethany

I did this as yet possibly unfinished painting in the car driving to and from Krista's baptism last night. I did it on my iPad using Artrage. I did not start from a photo of any kind, not even a reference photo-- it's a freehand digital finger painting. I used almost all the available tools--experimenting with them, just for the fun of it. I combined things that might be hard to combine on paper: oils, acrylics, water colors, pastels, crayons, pencils, air bush, etc. I think I used everything.

I painted it in the car in the dark in the backseat hurtling along the freeway over bumps and around turns. I am working to learn the new iPad Artrage. I couldn't have painted with oils or acrylics in that situation. I couldn't even type--I tried it!

For some reason, I kept wanting to add a crown of thorns, but felt it would be sacrilegious. I was thinking perhaps it reminds me, maybe because of the colors, of a famous painting of Jesus with the crown of thorns. I had a painting in mind, after I thought of it, but I googled it and couldn't find it. Maybe it wasn't a famous painting. Maybe just something I saw in someone's house. Originally, Bethany wasn't smiling. Smiling, it seems like a crown of thorns would be wholly inappropriate.

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A Tale of Two Paintings

Many years ago, I squatted in the pouring rain with my Nikkormat and my mother--who held an umbrella over my head--and snapped a photo of a yellow lady's slipper on the property of my botany professor, John L. Morrison. As a gift, he had the picture printed for me. It sat on the wall many long years and got all faded.

I was trying to learn Sketchbook Pro app on my new iPad and decided that I wanted to "finger paint" a picture of the Yellow Lady's slipper. It took me 3 1/2 weeks to complete it, in part because I was a newbie, and in part because I'm not that good. My friend Pam Perkins Frederick asked me to paint one on paper, which did--in gouache on green paper. I did it in three sessions.

The top picture is the new painting for Pam in gouache. The second picture is the same one 3rd draft, the third picture is the scan from the end of my first session working on it. I forgot to scan it at the end of my second session. The fourth picture is the iPad version which I made for Ballookey. I did not look at that while doing the new painting, I looked only at the original photograph. I did not draw either of these nor use a photograph in any way other than for reference. I painted them from scratch, both of them. The final picture is the original ancient photograph printed in 1971 but probably taken several years earlier.

I had considered doing one in water color and one in oils or acrylics, or both, but I'm tired of it for now and want to paint something new. (For some reason, I never get tired of painting Keith.)