Portrait Revolution

Spring is, well, springing in southern Wisconsin, and I have not been in the studio very much at all.  In fact, most of my time has been spent working outside, especially at the local cemetery where I photograph for Find a Grave, and also planning my upcoming May walking tour of the historic parts of the cemetery. I enjoy both doing research and getting outside to stretch my legs.

I have been working in sketchbooks a bit, and on a self-portrait. But today I'm tooting my personal horn about being included in a new art book called Portrait Revolution: Inspiration From Around the World For Creating Art in Multiple Mediums and Styles, by Julia L. Kay. Julia Kay started an online group on Flickr devoted to drawing a painting portraits.  People join the group, post photographs of themselves, and then are free to interpret the photos in any way.  Some people draw, some paint, some use digital media, one even did portraits on an Etch-A-Sketch. Some portraits are realistic, while others veer into abstraction or caricature.  All are interesting.

Anyway, months ago I was asked to submit a couple portraits for the book.  I was flattered to be asked, but had no idea what the final product would be like.  This past week I ordered and received my copy, and was thrilled to see what a beautiful book it is.

When I was first contacted about including two of the portraits I did, I was a little disappointed that the ones they chose were not favorites of mine.  But looking at the book now I can see what an effort was made to include a wide variety of artists, and a wide variety of media and artistic approaches.  I tend to experiment a lot, and both of my portraits included here reflect that. One is rather abstract and brightly colored, the other is a monoprint, enhanced with colored pencil.  I love seeing the way the folks who compiled these portraits show the original photo, plus several different approaches JKPP folks used to create art.

So thank you, Julia Kay for bringing together so many diverse folks from around the world to create art, and to find artistic kindred spirits.