Just Felt Like Painting A Girl In A Vyshyvanka (a Type Of Embroidered Shirt).

Just felt like painting a girl in a vyshyvanka (a type of embroidered shirt).

Hello,

It's been a while since I last posted something on here. As someone with close family in Ukraine (although luckily all of them are currently safe) the last month has been rather emotionally taxing on me. Because of that I am afraid that my posts might continue to be quite sparse in the coming weeks. I hope you understand and have a nice day/night 💙💛

“Ephemeral Shell”

This painting (especially regarding the flower imagery) is vaguely inspired by the so-called “Schnitterlied”, an originally anonymous (tho later published, revised and quoted by several authors in the following centuries) German poem/song, dealing with fleeting nature of the material compared to the eternal nature of the soul (as appears to be quite common in texts of this era). I came across it when revising for my school finals (which I am still somewhat in the middle of, hence also the recent lack of posts, sorry).

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So, I've had a watercolour underpainting for this little portrait for quite a while now, and a couple days ago I decided to finally get out my acrylic paints and paint it. I don't use acrylic paint that much, since it tends to be a bit messier and more work to clean compared to, say, watercolour. Still I am quite happy with how the painting looks.

Orestes and Erinys

A bit over a month ago I had to give a short presentation on Aischylos‘ Oresteia as part of my coursework and reading it gave me the idea for this piece.

Specifically, it is referencing lines 1057-1058 of the Libation Bearers, where, for the first time, Orestes is seeing the Furies.

(The text does explicitly describe blood dripping from the Furies’ eyes, but when I noticed this, the idea of a blood-covered face had already developed, and I chose to keep it. Also I didn’t have the time or patience to paint more than two figures, so I suppose you can imagine the rest of the Furies somewhere off-screen or something)

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(Close-ups)

🕯️🕯️

It may not be Christmas anymore, but I recently finished re-reading Charles Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol' and so I present to you this illustration of the Ghost of Christmas Past. My interpretation of the spirit is not entirely faithful to the description written in the book, as some elements were either impossible to really depict artistically or I just couldn't be bothered to paint them.

(Close-ups)

This took me a while to finish, oddly enough not because of the central figure ir the foliage, but rather because I just couldn't make the colours work out the way I wanted them to. Even now it look a bit dull to me. I guess that's what I get for not planning out a proper colour scheme. It also feels a bit weird to work in a different format if you, like me, usually paint on a 1x1 canvas. You do get used to it in a short amount of time, however.

But, putting all that aside, I do like the way the central figure especially turned out in regards to shading and anatomy. Also, the plants look kinda nice.

(Close-ups)