Portraits At The Pub 21 - Eljai | Tim Baker | Watercolour Paintings, Drawings & Acrylic Artworks

Eljai (detail), Portraits At The Pub, Fountain Pen and watercolour, Fabriano Artistico paper, 35x25cm.

Portraits At The Pub 21 – Eljai

Second Portraits At The Pub of 2022 and the model was Eljai (or was it Eljay or LJ?) and I started with a rather Victorian drawing, all prim and proper and weirdly elongated. I was sitting at the back rather than right at the front, so that gave me a different view than usual. I was using the Evergood as usual – which works well on this paper, less so other paper as I’ve found.

Eljai, Portraits At The Pub, Fountain Pen and wash, A4 sketchbook.

Then further experiments with the tempera paint sticks – here shown with a detail of the head. Hard to get to grips with these with the time constraints and also that they aren’t the best for detail. I might experiment with also marker and pen work with these, since they are semi-transparent. Had a chat with a fellow artist about these, Woody Pencils and Posca – I am not alone!

And it’s very evident that this style is very much my Posca work re-vitalised. Almost digital in fact, yet maybe postdigital? Just come across that concept and it described a lot of my work to a T – down to the back to basics nature and influence of digital works but in traditional forms.

Eljai, Portraits At The Pub, Tempera Paint Sticks, Winsor & Newton Acrylic Paper 14x10". — Eljai, Portraits At The Pub, Tempera Paint Sticks, Winsor & Newton Acrylic Paper 14×10″.

Eljai (detail), Portraits At The Pub, Tempera Paint Sticks, Winsor & Newton Acrylic Paper 14x10". — Eljai, Portraits At The Pub, Tempera Paint Sticks, Winsor & Newton Acrylic Paper 14×10″.

Being at the back I got a view of a lot of the class – well I say class, there is no teaching at Portraits At The Pub but I don’t know of another name for it. So I decided to draw it – it’s something I used to do in my life drawing days at Cass Art sometimes – the artifice of life and portrait drawing is that the people are in some ascetic quiet white private space – no, they are often surrounded by people and things, this is a look behind that curtain:

The Drawing Class (page 1), Fountain Pen and Wash, A4 sketchbook.

The Drawing Class (page 2), Fountain Pen and Wash, A4 sketchbook. — The Drawing Class (page 1), Fountain Pen and Wash, A4 sketchbook.

And then as we had a longer pose of 30 mins I did a ink and watercolour. I used to be far better at these but so rusty after not doing them for years. As usually the scanner weirdly picks out the ultramarine in a way that’s not so evident on the final piece, it seems to love that deep blue colour! But it’s pretty close to the final piece.

Eljai, Portraits At The Pub, Fountain Pen and watercolour, Fabriano Artistico paper, 35x25cm.

It’s amazing how hard it is to now mix skin tone compared to my quick 20-30 min life sketches of years ago, I need to pick that up again or find another life drawing/portrait outlet since Cass now only does mornings, and of all the things I want to do in my mornings, looking at naked strangers isn’t one of them! Although as you can see from my other pieces, I am heading more into a fauvist/abstract direction, so maybe not needed. I like to keep multiple strands going, which is a bit confusing for people.