The portrait, any portrait, is just one still instant
in a life composed of millions of instants.
I think of it as less a stop frame movement and
more the sum of all those instants. Some of our
attributes are present throughout our lives;
some are more fleeting. It is my job to sort
through it all, pick and choose which attributes
I wish to portray to tell the truest story of
the individual.
The next step: Portraits benefit from the
subject posing while I paint; and yet
I find that this circumstance becomes
less and less possible for many reasons.
I take my own source photographs,
that is photos of the subject from many angles,
in many environments, during various moods
and activities. These, in addition to the archive
of family images, provide a range of identity
that help me design the image.
