Presidential Portraits

George Washington Study

Over the holidays I began an intense stretch of oil color portraits.   I had finished a short course in academic drawing as described in my previous post and this portrait work builds upon it.


Realistic portraiture was one of the first classes I took many years ago.   It was a struggle mostly because my drawing experience was lacking.   Since that time, my experience has grown, and especially in drawing it is greatly expanded; it still is hard work nevertheless.

Abraham Lincoln Study

I have moved from charcoal drawings to oil color, but the baseline drawing in a monotone is still the most important stage.  I am constantly checking the placement of my brushstrokes with respect to established landmarks.  I have been spending as much time making adjustments with a paper towel as with a brush. 

My first few portraits were not good.   Yes, they looked like human beings, just not the people I was painting! I learned that a good baseline drawing with a carefully measured likeness is just as vital to success in the outcome of the oil portrait as with the charcoal drawings. If the monochrome underpainting did not look like the person, what made me think that adding flesh color would transform it to look like the person?

George W. Bush Study

Shared in this post are three presidential portraits done recently.   There was a noticable progression from poor to decent, but because I couldn't tolerate the poor portraits, I have since gone back and reworked them all.   Obviously not done from life!   It is said that even in Lincoln's day, true to his humble self, he never sat for a portrait. Any portraits or busts that exist today were done from photographs which was a new technology in the mid-1800's.

These portraits were done using the John Howard Sanden portrait palette from his book "Portraits from Life in 29 Steps."  The prescribed pre-mixing of colors was a switch for me as I usually mix color as I need it.   I came to appreciate having the fleshtones ready and believe it provided good harmony overall.