Koningin woman portrait mixed media

Koningin

Original Reference

Saturated

Collage 

Well, this is Koningin, means Queen in Afrikaans, so I have really dubbed and called her Queenie during the painting process.   When I saw the photo reference I thought she was very regal, and, of course, I loved the color and pattern of her headscarf.  Figured it would be a good challenge.

As you can see the original photo was really dark and pretty much devoid of color.  So put it into the photo program and really saturated the color.  This now became a whole new photo to work with.

Next step was to do the collage.  You can see on the sketchbook that I have taped multiple pages together to give it some support, sort of like a watercolor block, so that the paper will dry back pretty flat after I applied all the matte medium.  Once dried I painted random lines on the page, then put plain white tissue paper over the background.   The effect of the tissue softened the color and lines.  Paul's used coffee filter gave it's life to become the partial circle.   I have had some cigar paper (from many years ago) that I tore and put over what would be the flesh tones.

From there is was simply adding acrylic and lots of color.  The photo really can't be adjusted correctly to get a true representation of all the colors in her skin tones.  This was a different palette:  Had the pthalo violet, purple, pthalo turquoise, cobalt, cad red light, black cherry, Mississippi mud and nutmeg as just a few of the colors.   One thing I tried to do was to put some or all of the colors in the other colors so that the colors would remain harmonious.

Thanks much for stopping by and taking a look.