100 Potraits Challenge- First 10pcs

Whew, time flies and it's 2022, 2 years into the COVID-19 Pandemic since 2020 March or so. Along the way I did paintings that I wanted continue from my project in New Zealand, did some self portraits, some commissioned works.. then... all of the sudden I'm not sure what theme specifically I wanted to paint. All I knew is I wanted to paint portraits. 

Inspired by an artist who I purchased his course, A.J.Alper, on Domestika, mentioned about 100 portrait challenge. Being a big portrait fans I thought this is a good idea. So I begun my portrait painting journey. 

I sourced my photos from friends, facebook, pexels and other free to use photo website, and Instagram too with the permission of the person. I wanted to take photos of people around me as model too, but am scared of covidsssssss. Would be nice to paint from live too, hit me up if you would like to model for me hahah.

The paintings are all done in small scale of A3 size as I only have a small corner where I do my painting, minus the luxury of storing heaps of large size paintings. The biggest pro of small painting is that I could finish them faster, allowing me to experience trial and error in a short period. It too helps me with my indecisive behavior, which occasionally become the reason I procrastinate. I always need to remind myself,

 " I have 100 to go! 100 to try in anyways I like!  Don't spend too much time thinking if these are the perfect reference to go with." 

Though I can't assure this is a good mindset, hence I learnt to a quick sketch prior to figure out how I feel about those selected reference, and if I wanted to make it into a finalize painting.

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Here are my first 10 paintings, started since August 2021.

Initially I started off with thinking doing classic shoulder above portraits, however it slowly evolves into including intricate details, like fine strokes of hair, a background that gives the portrait a story...

Portrait #1

-A very standard portrait to begin with.

Portrait #2

-Is this considered a "portrait"? Well, I don't really know, but I know I'm amazed with how this turns out. The hair is done in such brush stroke that I loved the result .

Portrait #3

-Considered the first failed painting in first 10', I scrape quite a few times eventually I decided to give up and take it as a lesson, which perhaps could be a bad reference choice :( 

Portrait #4

-back to doing normal portraits...

Portrait #5

-the first half body portrait in this project. This is my high school friend Lydia with her violin. I don't know how violin are usually hold, but the fingers pose was sure weird to paint.

Portrait #6 (sold)

-after painting Portrait #2 I really wanted to paint a back portrait again. Selected this picture and experiment with realistic detailed hair and abstract background.

Portrait #7 (sold)

-While looking thru photos of my facebook friends I really like this OCD-kinda set up, the colourful details, neatly arrange alcoholic drinks, a sign board on the edge. Everything is perfect. Sure it took me patience to paint the background more then the person, but it's one of the painting I enjoy the most in first 10s.

Portrait #8

-found this cool reference with lemons and greens and interesting hairstyle with nice lighting. It was fun to paint.

Portrait #9

-And...I fell into the rabbit hole of back portrait, not to mention falling in love with cultural designs of traditional clothing. 

Portrait #10

-And l like to use palette knife for maneuvering paint for abstract background, tried sticking flat based pearls on the cheongsam as pop out embellishment.

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That's all for now, thanks for reading! :)