A recent blog entry from the studio has been a long time coming and as such there is much to report. After a return from overseas Nigel had his exhibition at Gunyulgup in January: it was great to see all of the works hanging together, which brought them together as a full body of work.
Since then the main project has been developing the wax technique and surface for upcoming portrait prizes: The Black Swan Portrait Prize here in Perth and the Archibald over east. As his subject Nigel has chosen to depict Richard Woldendorp, a renowned aerial photographer and close friend. I have included some photographs of Nigel's development of surface and technique as well as some images of the work in progress.
The image above and directly below show one of the processes for the development of the surface. After the build up of colours using wax and oils (which is down with the image hanging on the easel on the wall in the studio) the layer is enforced by laying down the canvas and painting uncoloured wax evenly over the surface. This is done in the bright light so that texture of the surface is visible and then it is adjusted and evened out with the use of a heat gun and a metal scraper. This process makes the surface ready for the next layers.
Now directly below are two images of the work in progress the first shows the entire image, and the working composition with Richard in the foreground with an interpretation of one of his landscape photographs as his context. The second image show a close up detail of one of the eyes, I hope this shows the depth and variety of colour that is used to create detail at a distance.
Also there we have done some significant changes to the website, with a new layout that is hopefully more aesthetically appealing as well as more functional, check it out:
www.nigelhewitt.com.au
