2016 Christmas Commissions

Since Christmas is over and everybody should have just about opened all their presents by now, it is time to reveal the sketches that people commissioned me for gifts. The first was by my aunt, Emily, for her girlfriend, a picture of the two of them together. She asked me to do this one all the way back in April or May and I finished it sometime in June or July. All in all, the 9x12 piece actually only took me 5 hours and 30 minutes once I sat myself down to do it. This was also my first time ever using a smudging tool, having discovered what the rolled paper stick in my pack of pencils was for, lol. It was a really sensitive tool so it took a little getting used to but for Emma’s girlfriend’s skin, I liked it a lot to achieve that smooth transition of tones.

The next one was requested by a friend of the family’s for her daughter. She asked me to do it back in October and I was right in the middle of the daycare murals. Even still, I didn’t finish this one until the 8^th of December and it took me only 4 hours. I used the smudge tool again but I’m not so sure I like the effect of it. Still, I think the piece turned out beautifully and I’m glad she really liked it.

 

I was actually surprised that I only got these two commissions for the holidays because I expected more. Partly, it makes me wonder if I’m charging too much for them but it’s also one of those things where I don’t want to lower my prices. I’m actually not particularly fond of this type of work and it is an agonizing process getting myself to just sit down and do the things. Once I do, I can get them done fairly quickly. 

It’s taken a little honesty and analysis on my part to realize why I don’t like doing them: they’re imperfect. Granted, everything I do feels this way. The oil painting especially has that moment where I press beyond the desire to look like the reference photo but the paint has enough give, that I feel like my instincts and movements aren’t far off from what is necessary to make it still look like what it’s supposed to look like. The pencil is not so. Every single time I experience a moment where I see the drawing deviating from the photo, either while I’m drawing or after it’s done. Very often, there’s not a whole lot I can do and it’s a kind of “this cross stitch is off by 3 because of this spot all the way back here” moment; it is a destruction of work, an unraveling that is necessary to go back and correct it.

I noticed this moment very early on in the family friend’s commission right around the daughter’s ear and earring. I’m right handed so I act as a Xerox machine, starting from the upper left side of the paper and moving down to the bottom right, so, 90% of the page was blank at this point. The problem that I noticed was that her ear was bigger than it was supposed to be in the drawing, meaning the space between things would be off. But at that point, it was December 6^th or 7^th and she’d commissioned me back in October. Any excuse to delay or stop or “give up” would be all I needed to chicken out of completing the work.

So, I have this moment of extreme discomfort where I have to swallow my pride and perfectionist desires and just push myself to “finish it.” The problems aren’t “fixed” and continue to pop up in different areas all over the picture so what I’m left with is this really unsatisfying, imperfect thing that does not look like the people in the photo. …which is the point of the whole thing and why I was commissioned: to draw an exact photo of these specific people.

My skill isn’t based upon actually knowing how to draw anything when it comes to this sort of “copy” work. I view this as the difference between my talent being in my eyes or in my hands. Coming up with a drawing from my head, my talent is in my hands; they’re actively alive and “remembering” movements from drawing something before or translating a vision from within my mind. Sketching a photo, my talent is coming from my eyes and my hands become this mechanical tool, like they’re asleep and on autopilot. So, it’s not as if more practice is going to make my results any better. I’m not going to “see” this photo better at some point in the future. What I’m stuck with, then, is this odd balancing act of surrendering to a lack of perfection or never finishing anything because that is really uncomfortable and I’d rather not do it.

I don’t really like admitting to this dislike of sketches because so far, this is my most requested type of artwork. I have done more sketches for more different people than I have murals and by far, the paintings are more expensive. So, they will always get requested less than the sketches. Since this is my livelihood, I can’t really afford to discourage anybody from asking me for anything, so, it’s one of those things that I just have to suck it up and live with. That being said, so far, these mistakes and errors seem like a mostly personal problem; I haven’t gotten any complaints and people are usually extremely satisfied with my work. Which is honestly what makes it worth it, knowing that the flaws that I see are probably just that: only things that I see.