Doug, I like the way you use two light sources to obtain contrasts of light and shade. The light from the top left (possibly natural sunlight) is so bright that the hat, instead of being a trademark appendage, really serves its purposes, protecting the face and also using the shade to reveal the features, which would otherwise be too bright to see properly. But to achieve this, the shade is only a semi-shade, with another light source (likely artificial light) to the mid-right, its beam hitting the cheek at the bottom of the ear and lighting up the chin, nose, mouth and long hair from the right.
This interplay of light and shade itself has a light side and a dark side. First, it works on the vertical plane: at the bottom, you have a fiery darkness (the dark shirt with streaks of red) contrasting at the top with what looks like, or suggests, the outdoors. And secondly, the wispy hair lighting up the darker right side somewhat resembles the smoke that Simon Parkes says you find around a djinn, some of which he says are benevolent.
All of this, combined with the almost straight-on pose, facing only fractionally to our left, seems to encapsulate Bill’s ability to sit comfortably, unblinkingly (you can’t blink for a still image!), and with an unwavering smile (you can paint a wavering one), amid these conflicting forces.
None of this is exactly what I meant by interestingly new. That is to be found in the tiny divergence from the absolute physical resemblance that makes art art (and also sometimes makes photography art). But of course, the above is precisely what you are doing, and why, when your painting strays from the identikit portrait (talking of which – you would need to check with Bill – I gather Bill Ryan senior was its inventor). See
https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...l=1#post858547
Re: THOSE WHO BLEW THE WHISTLE: Painted Portraits of Whistleblowers by artist Doug Auld
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