a special note to jon (portrayed above) regarding his portrait swap with louise (below): no way are you hogging blogspace, jon! in my mondo beyondo dream come true, portrait parties will replace drug abuse as the most notorious addiction on earth. just pace yourself, brother, you don't want to end up like our last portrait junkie did.
jon (portrayed above) is having a lot of fun trading portraits, this time with alex (below). now's the time to ask him for a trade, folks! before his hand cramps and he's forced to take (some very cool) photos again.
leonie (portrayed above) laughed so hard during her portrait party with sarah (below) that marshmallows came out her nose!
this portrait of flo (above) isn't the best likeness that julie has captured of her "hard to pin down" daughter. it is a wonderful representation of her family portraits though and it speaks to one of my favorite philosophies of portraiture; namely, a good portrait is more than a good likeness. flo's drawing of her mom (below) is another beautiful example.
when the attendance at their painting group was low, judith (portrayed on the left) and jana (on the right) took turns drawing each other.
tom and julie's family remind me of my own. they seem to draw each other a lot. son and mom drew these blind contour portraits to pass time on the train.
sandra fisher (portrayed above) is considered an unusually sociable artist because she enjoyed painting other artists and being painted herself. this portrait of her by maurice cockrill (portrayed below) is different from any of his other paintings. that's why i love it so much. he set his style aside to paint her portrait and they ended up really looking at each other.
david (drawn on the left, photographed on the right) shared this photo of a portrait swap between himself and his pal, daniel johnston.
can't you just see patrick (portrayed above) mackin' on the ladies in a dark corner of the portrait party? it may be a complete misrepresentation but, thanks to this portrait and the previous swap, i can't help by see him as a silk-robed ladies man in the style of the cosmopolitan. thanks to morgan (below) for promoting this ridiculous reputation.
holman-hunt, rossetti, and millais are famous for their gang, the pre-raphaelite brotherhood. besides disturbing the peace with their paintings of green trees (brown was the fashionable color for trees at the time), the brotherhood drew each other all the time. holman-hunt drew millais and rossetti (above). rossetti drew these great cartoon of millais and holman-hunt (below).
millais seems to be the flake of this portrait party but he wasn't. he worked his friends into his illustrations. can you "where's waldo" the portrait of rossetti in millais' painting below?
click the painting for a hint.
here are two of my favorite quick portraits by my wife and me. i caught christine (above) sketching a picture of my mom. my parents actually came to town last weekend and i was bummed that we didn't have a portrait party. i was curious to see how christine and my mom would draw one another. one of the things that i love about drawing with each of them is that they are both so humble. they both draw. they both draw very well. but they both seem delighted and surprised when the drawings are complete. my mom smiles and waves away compliments. christine gets a childlike glow, especially when she captures a good likeness, like this one (below) that she got of me.
the two painters portrayed above are frank auerbach and sandra fisher. the artist, ronald b. kitaj, is credited with bringing pop art to britain even though his work clearly defies that label. auerbach drew sandra and kitaj below.
and sandra painted her husband, kitaj, below.
it looks like auerbach up and ran before sandra could paint him also. too bad really.
justin (portrayed above) IS cool! check out the drawing he did of his teacher, our friend, steve loya.
jeannette langmead is the well-deserved winner of the first portrait party contest. her prize will be posted (and mailed) as soon as our portrait swap is completed. thanks to all the portrait partners who helped her along!
