Watercolor Self Portrait: Botticelli and Seurat Style
Written by Teresita Blanco (The Artsy Sister)
Today, I wanted to show you my latest watercolor paintings. The first one was done Seurat style. Georges Seurat is the inventor of pointillism. It is a style where you use dots in order to make a painting.
The dots are usually of primary colors. They blend together optically when you move away from the painting. I recently read a biography about him. He died young because he liked maidens more than he liked painting.
A good chunk of the impressionist painters died for that very reason, with the exception of Degas and Monet. Both men were too busy painting to support their families, in order to stray into the red-light district.
This brings me back to my self-portrait. I chose as reference a study that Seurat did in preparation for A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. I went outside with an umbrella, and I had my brother take a photograph of me.
Using this photo as reference I crafted my self-portrait. I added ink lines in order to keep myself from getting lost. The colors themselves were added pointillism style. I used a lot of cue tips in order to make this painting.
The second artwork was done Botticelli style. Botticelli is defined by idealism and beautiful hair. I used as reference his Portrait of Simonetta Vespucci. Simonetta was also the maiden who modeled for his Birth of Venus painting.
I took a side profile photo and then I went to make my self-portrait. I kept the background restrained. There was not a lot of look at in the Simonetta painting. I spent most of my time working on the hair portion of my painting.
Botticelli spends most of his time developing the hair of his models. Overall, it was an interesting effort. There are not a lot of similarities between Seurat and Botticelli.
Both were kinda doing an Egyptian profile thing. Their models do look rather stiff. I think I ranted enough about my watercolor paintings. My name is Teresita Blanco, the Artsy Sister. Bye, bye and God bless.
