"Steve" Photograph

My interest is portraiture, I aim to capture and represent a multitude of varying emotions that any one person can posses. There are quantities of human faces, but there are many more faces, for each person has several. - Rainer Marie Rilke. The face is an extremely versatile subject matter, each offering countless challenges for me to explore.I'm at the beginning of creating art that aligns its self with elements of the feminist movement, notions of the gaze are strongly entwined within the composition, I aim to create dominant female figures, that challenge their viewers, and make them feel a sense of inferiority. We have grown up in a society where the female has become accustomed to being looked at, put upon a pedestal to be judged and criticised on features which conform to what society perceives to be attractive. My portraits try to illustrate this issue and fight against it with what has been described by some as 'sorrowful' gazes, intense and unnerving creating an uncomfortable environment for my audience surrounded by larger-than-life faces.Inspiration comes from various sources, one of which is the contemporary figurative painter Jenny Saville. Her dominant and imposing larger-than-life figures, have a huge impact on my work, although our painting styles differ greatly. I admire how she achieves precise detail with thick, simple, almost expressionistic brush-strokes. I strive to juxtapose detailed description with loose, expressive and uncontrolled paintwork.I do not conform to the conventional way of oil painting when I create my portraits. One of the basic techniques of oil painting is the principle of painting fat over lean. This means layering thicker paint over the top of leaner paint that has been mixed with turpentine. I reverse this practice for my own means, under-painting with thicker oil paint, layering diluted paint over the top. This disperses the pigment so loosely that it renders it translucent, and makes it possible to see the colours of the first layers thus creating a multi-tonal effect. I discovered through experimentation the effects of using lemon juice with the diluted paint. The lemon juice sits on the under-painting not allowing pigment to soak into the canvas thus revealing the tones of the vibrant base. I like to present people to my audience in thought provoking compositions....