Final Evaluation for Painting 1/2

I feel that this painting is a very good reflection of my project. With my project being about juxtaposing light and dark, life and death, and positive and negative, its all about creating a surreal, warped reality. And this is exactly what my painting is.

The object of the painting - the girl is very melancholy and despite the lack of emotion in her face, the fact her face is emotionless is juxtaposed with the intense emotion in the sombre atmosphere, Half of her face is in full shadow, giving away only half of her identity. It's as though she is trying to hide.

The black shadow concealing her face - to hide, has been contrasted vastly with the bottom right of her body which is hardly there at all. So there is a warped reality with how at the same time she is very much there, she is also invisible. This is quite a surreal situation.

To make it more surreal, I juxtaposed antlers onto her head, this relates to previous work I have done in my sketchbook, and it certainly makes the atmosphere more powerful. Again, one of the antlers is very much there, very dominant, however the other is very blurry, out of focus and hardly there at all. This makes you question id this is real or not, with the faded antler, does this mean it is there at all, or is it all just being dreamt up?

The colours used to paint the person are either all there or very subtle, so either dark greys, blacks or whites and pinks. The application of paint is another contrast, it was either thick, confident and gestural, or very watered down, with drips, and colours bleeding into another colour. Very soft, pretty and barely there, or harsh and dominant.

The added juxtapositions of the materials and techniques help add to the surreality or the image itself.

If the colours and the application of the paint was constant throughout, then there would be less of an impact, and the warped reality wouldn't be so well reflected.

I like the way I added the small illustrative details with the flowers. Because there is not much precise definition in line person and background, its nice that there is some paint smaller details.

I didn't want it to be very eye catching because the image is already extremely maximalist. I had to be careful with going too far with it.

I do think that despite the full image, it is quite balanced, I made the image take the eye diagonally from bottom left to top right, and because the whole body isn't filled in, there is space.

One of my favourite parts of the image is the eye an the definition in the cheek. The eye lashes are really fluffy, light and I really like the contrast in the blackness between the lashes and the soft skin on the eye lid and on the cheek below. I like the colours on the face which isn't in the shadow, they are warm and very life like.

I really like the depth of the red in the lips too.

So, after analysing this I feel it relates well to a surreal warped reality, with lots of juxtaposing and contrasts. Having this printed onto A0 will create a real impact, creating even more atmosphere and depth.