Portraits of Family and Friends

Drawing portraits from life is one my favorite ways to capture a likeness of the person being drawn. Working from photographs when necessary is absolutely fine too, especially when you want to capture a certain time or place.

Carole and I had known one another through an aerobics class she taught in the evenings at a local school. We talked about doing a portrait of her as a special anniversary gift for her husband. She sat at my kitchen table for about two hours and it was done. Both Carole and her husband thought it was a great likeness of her and loved it. Its so exciting when you're able to capture the likeness of a person in your drawing.

While on vacation in the Wisconsin Dells I did the portraits of my two children shown here. My daughter was six and my son eight at the time. We were just hanging out in the hotel room watching T.V. and playing games when I had the idea to draw them. I used Prismacolor pencils to do each of the drawings.

A good friend of mine asked me to do a portrait from a special grade school photograph of her daughter who'd passed away.

I was happy to attempt it but nervous at the same time. I wanted it to be perfect as it meant so much to her to have it done. My friend really liked the colored pencil drawing I did and said it captured her Jessie.

The actual portrait was full of more color than the color copy I had made of it seen here. I liked the idea that something I drew could give my friend some comfort in some small way.

Chase was a teacher, mentor and good friend of mine who tragically lost his life while hiking in Montana. I hadn't met his mother prior to his death, but wanted to do something for her in his memory. Drawing his portrait was all I could think to do during such a sad time. I used his health club photo ID to create his likeness. His mother absolutely loved it and said that he looked liked an angel. She has it beautifully displayed in her home with other special items of his. Remarkably his mother and I became good friends through this portrait and the connection I had with her wonderful son. We take yoga classes together and often have coffee and chat after.

I did this colored pencil portrait of a good friends father. I had the honor of meeting him on several occasions and always enjoyed his company. He was a practical man and really fun to talk to. I was so sad to hear of his passing and decided to draw a portrait of him for my friend Tammy as a special Christmas present in his memory. I used a photo from his funeral prayer card to work from. Tammy has two sisters so I made copies of it for each of them as well. It was well received by all of them.