Well, after all that work, I can’t say I’m exactly happy with how this came out. But, there are some things in here that I’m proud of.
The thing I don’t like, unfortunately, is the cat. The left shoulder doesn’t look connected to the right shoulder, and that disruption is enough to make it feel incorrect. She almost reads like a dog. Womp Womp.
The good news is, I like everything else. There are two things that I particularly like: the wall, and the scene in the window.
In all my other studies, I was trying to make the wall a simple flat wash. I realized today how boring that is, and when I painted the wall tonight, I tapped in some pigment, and then hit it with a few spritzers of water. Then, I flicked a couple of drops of pigment and let it do its thing. I really like the result.
The scene in the window I particularly like because it looks like the window is fogged up except for the slash through the middle. This is a subtle thing that adds interest to an otherwise fairly dead part of the painting. I achieved this by prewetting the window, while leaving a slash in the middle as dry paper. Then, I dabbed some pigment down, and let it go. In the places where the window has been prewetted, it spread out to give a bunch of ghostly soft edges. In the middle, I got crisp edges, and it ended up looking like the window was fogged up except for that spot. It’s something I want to explore more.
I also like the bedspread. This was yet another element of the composition that felt very dead in my studies. I realized when looking at the source photo once more that the pattern on the bed spread odds only really discernible if you look very closely at it. Otherwise, it really just serves to lighten the values a bit. I decided to try to capture the pattern by dragging a thirsty brush across the paper instead of relying on rendering the pattern completely. The result is a little bit of interest in the bed spread that doesn’t compete with the focal point.
The curtain ended up ok. I like it, but not as much as the curtain in my Study #9.
The cat is overworked, and she doesn’t feel as fresh and lively as I had hoped. Oh well. I really tried. That’s all I can hope for, is to give it my real honest best, and see what happens.
I’m pretty sick of this painting now, so I’m going to move on to something else. Just not sure what…
And here’s my painting. Good night’