Saturday, September 27, 2014

John Seerey-Lester Doing a Demo

John Seerey-Lester is known for his wildlife, landscape, and historical paintings. He and his wife Suzie are featured on the cover of the upcoming October/November issue of International Artist magazine.

While John did a demo at the SKB Workshop recently in Wyoming, I sat off to the side and painted his portrait in watercolor. 


Here's the first stage. I sketched the lay-in with a raw sienna colored pencil, and then added some watercolor washes on the face, hat, and background.

I then painted the black shirt and the hand, carefully dodging around the suspenders and the bracelet. For the white sideburn hair and the glasses I used a white colored pencil and a touch of gouache. 
John and Suzie kept up a running commentary of painting advice and stories of encounters with big game as the group of students huddled around and asked questions. The apparent color shift is between a digital camera and a scanner.



2 comments:

Joel Wetzel said...

Sir, your first stage has me envious of the likenesses you seem to capture with ease.

I'm working on it and appreciate seeing what and how you do.

Unknown said...

James,
John is a character isn't he?! a great artist and teacher. I took a class with John snd Suzy a few years ago.. what fun they are.
:)