Colourful People

The COLOURFUL PEOPLE series consists of 25 life-size acrylic portraits of visual artists who were my contemporaries back in Ottawa. Friends and colleagues, skillful and creative, they have influenced my work in some way or the other. Their passion and dedication to their art inspired me to organize and curate an exhibition that would include their own artwork and their words, making each portrait more complete.

The portraits were painted from a combination of life and my own photographs. Drawing the artists from life allowed me to study and remember the visual information I needed to complete the painting. Before I used photos, I had painted the portrait in my mind.

The energy I felt in the interaction with the artist posing was powerful. I knew that whatever was happening in our life at the time would somehow become integrated with the image.