Tag Archives: Winifred Whitfield Portrait Oil Paintings

Girl in Repose

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If it weren’t for the fact that the pain is no longer felt once the portrait is “finished”, I would cease to paint them. A really excellent portrait painter, now with 20 years of experience said that he is still waiting for portrait painting to become easier. Even as ones skill grow, brush handling becomes more competent, drawings can be done more quickly – it’s still so very very hard. It’s painful – honest. I know I shouldn’t complain and it’s boring you for me to do so – so I’ll stop. There are painters who paint portraits who have no concern for about obtaining “portrait likeness” and unless one is doing a portrait commission there is actually no reason for such concern. So far, I’ve never been able to lack that concern. I always feel it’s a measure of my competency to obtain a likeness of the person being painted. I may try to get over that and seek to create portrait as art – which would be a completely different mindset. At this point I don’t know what that would look like for me. I can think of other artist work, however, which gives me clues as to what it was for them – Modigliani for example. Below is a type of portrait I never tried before – “a smiling face”.

Mexican Lady Smiling – 8×10 Oil Painting Head Study by Winifred Whitfield

I have no idea. why I created this painting. It didn’t begin with a smile for sure. I painted her mouth closed in my initial attempt but it just didn’t look right. I was in Mexico when I saw this lady at a big market place. She nodded and gave me permission to photograph her. She was a very friendly type person and anytime I saw her she had a big smile on her face. There is something I am drawn to in portraiture, more so than any other subject in painting. I paint an occasional still life of fruit or flowers and and though still not easy, I can alter the look of the flowers and fruit and it’s probably for the better. I think I’m a painter because it is so hard. If it were easy, no doubt I would have quite long time ago. It’s very challenging but when I stick with a painting, in the end there is a sense of accomplishment and transformation and I feel proud. That’s why I keep 85% of my paintings. They’re framed on my walls. I’m surrounded by them and I enjoy them very much. There is only one room which has been spared – my bedroom. I want to awake to blank walls and the possibility of what’s coming next, I have no need to see what I have accomplished already.

Garden Life: It’s kind of sad to call what I have a garden. I should probably label it as container life – but I won’t. Below is a screenshot I captured from the internet, advertising the seeds. I have no relationship to this image.

Common Name: Love Lies Bleeding – Screen shot from Internet

Below is an example the new “Love Lies Bleeding” plants I have started. I’ll just stick with the common name “Love Lies Bleeding” I use to have lots of this plant in my garden which I always grew from seed. It’s quite dramatic as you can see. If I had started my seeds earlier in the season, I would have plants now which resemble the example above. Instead, my plant development can be seen below. I think there is still hope for a beautiful flowering plant before summers end.

My “Love Lies Bleeding:

I have 7 containers of this plant. Most are now located between by Geranium planters. They are not quite as large as this one. This is the largest because it’s seedlings were never transplanted. However, the plants in all seven containers are all growing really fast now, so hopefully I’ll have some flowering soon. Those long red flowers you see are actually long pods of seeds – a grain which can be harvested. I will never have to purchase seeds again and I’ll definitely get them started earlier next year. The little plant you see to the lower right of the blue pot is “Rainbow Chard”. I was even later in planting those seeds. I was hopeful I could find a 6 pack of plant starts as I have done in the past but I couldn’t find any. Rather than give up, I ordered seeds and got them started.

The RESISTANCE: My Home Owners Association told me last week that I had to remove my signs – the signs I showed you. Flags are allowed but not signs. It’s in the bylaws – though signs have been permitted before. I had a Black Lives Sign on my front balcony and in my container garden area for months a few years back, others did too – but not this sign this time. So, I took it down and immediately ordered to 12×18 flags, that say RESIST and continue to have the same size American flag on either side of them.

I’m happy to see a growing number of people’s unfavorable response to the horrendously cruel deportations and cages for detainees. It’s all racism. This administration prioritizes policies which support a white America run by white cis gendered males with subjugated females having babies to offset the browns and Blacks he can’t get rid of. Donald’s’ unfavorability declines, but he doesn’t care at all. He’s not running again but he plans to remain in power. Something which concerns me greatly are statements he and others have made that “there won’t ever be another presidential election”. “Just vote for me this time and you’ll never have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed. Just vote for me this time.” he told the Evangelicals. Given his defiance of the courts, the support of the Supreme Court in his enhanced executive power, which includes his ability to call out the National Guard and military as enforcement anytime he deems it necessary, I have no doubt about Donald’s plans to abolish Americas attempt at Constitutional government. In practice, we no longer have a functional House and Senate even at this time – except to do the bidding of the president. The only glimmer of hope is to have a Democratic sweep of the midterms and a successful impeachment to get him out of office. No doubt every conceivable trick will be attempted to prevent that from happening. The Republican party leadership is lawless and we have no checks against this while they continue to govern.

Unfortunately, Democratic lawmakers are only willing to do “the right thing” the right way. Remember when Michelle said “when they go low, we go high”. That is obviously not going to work. All is so sad! Resist in anyway you can. Winifred

Related Images:

WW Haitian Girl Winifred Whitfield Still life WW Red Tree WW Fall Maple WW mom-child WW Portrait S ww-portrait-A

Sargent Study

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John Singer Sargent Portrait Study

This was an interesting endeavor. Perhaps you’ve seen this painting in a book or in online images. it is from a painting titled Daughters of Edward Darley. It depicts Darley’s four daughters. She is the girl to the far left. This is head and shoulders of a full body, interior room painting. When I began this painting I was not aware of the many delicate color and tonal variations in the highlight area of her face. There is little point in trying to duplicate each brushstroke, but I did work diligently to create her likeness and the overall look. It was tedious to paint but enjoyable in a way. I did a pretty good job. I’m not sure what I learned in this process but learning is always an incremental and cumulative process. I can never paint a portrait in a day – I am definitely not a fast painter. Below is the painting progression which took place over 5 days.

There’s an online site for painters which looked at my paintings as they considered whether my paintings would be appropriate for their site. One of the reasons they liked my site was that I very often showed a painting progression, as above, whereas most painters do not. It’s never pretty – but I’m not concerned. I forgot the initial sketch even this time. I don’t know if there’s any real interest but I’ll try to do a bit more of this in the future. In the end, I was invited to the site but decided not to participate. It felt too much like social media.

Below is one of my favorite digital paintings and favorite memories.

Trombone Playing Teamwork

The story is captured in the painting. Its a digital painting I did years ago. I was in New York. I descended the steep stairs to Grand Central Station to board a train and was delighted and astonished to see this little girl playing her trombone while her little brother held the music. The trombone case held the money thus far collected. Only in New York I thought. I ask for permission and stood for a few minutes to observe the performance and to photograph them. I love the color variation throughout. Why don’t I do that now? I felt so free and creative when I was digital because if I messed up, I could throw away one layer and try something else. Not so with oil paint but I’m getting there.

THE RESISTANCE: It depresses me to think about the ongoing nightmare we live in. The resistance gives hope but I saw an interview yesterday which I think is critical and may serve us well. I would predict that there is absolutely NO WAY Donald can make it though the remainder of his term. The problem is that the MAGA Republicans have all been so “potty trained” to behave with the same level of cruelty and lawlessness. He might go but what follows? May 1, 2025 – I watched a NEWS NATION interview. If I had any doubt about Donald’s COGNITIVE decline, no doubt lingers. Donald has long had trouble maintaining a single coherent line of thought but it has become much worse. Donald was ask about his position toward HARVARD and his desire the cancel Federal Research dollars, control hiring, student selection and the curriculum. His response shocked and totally perplexed the entire panel and me. He wove a long rambling response started with comments about HARLEM ( which initially I thought he misunderstood for the word Harvard but that was not it. He then spoke of Black support in the election, then he made comments about of billions of research dollars he would cancel at Harvard, then back to Harlem where he said they wanted to do remedial math like (2+2) he said, then back to comments about horrible foreign students at Harvard. His brain is a scrambled mess. Perhaps you saw the ABC interview where Donald was insistent that the M I 13 text which he has been shown on a photo of the fist of Garcia, and firmly believes this text is real. It was explained to Donald that this Arial font had been Photoshoped onto a photo of Garcia’s hand. He was told it is not real but Don was insistent, even combative, siting over and over and over and over again that it is real. Garcia’s hand by comparison has been photographed recently in El Salvador, and does not show any such graphic information. Donald’s mind is not in good shape. For any who were concerned about President Biden, Donald is far worse. President Biden would sometimes forget but he never went off on multiple incoherent tangents. Trumps playbook is to be mean, unapologetic and cruel.

And now, Congressional Republicans have voted that Don can deport American citizens to El Salvador. Can you believe any of this!!! Don, a mad man surrounded by incompetent hateful lackeys. It’s all so dangerous. Winifred

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Portrait Abstract

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Portrait Abstract Oil Painting 12×16 by Winifred Whitfield

See below: I thought I’d show you a bit of the beginning. I didn’t know where I’d go with this when I started. You can see I could have developed it in a more refined traditional manner to. I chose, however, to be more daring and to see if I could actually pull it off. I’ve tried before without good results in my opinion. But those were steps toward becoming a bit more experienced and confident in a more abstracted portrait look which is not natural for me. I both enjoyed the process and and I actually like it.

Initial block-in

Above: Notice the fine lines white lined on the forehead. and off to the left. Those are remnants of a grid I sketched in order to place the features accurately.

Block-in 2 – some values added.

Overall, I spent quite a bit of time developing the sketch and block-in over, which I painted. I didn’t want too much assistance with the features, however, because that doesn’t facilitate developing stronger drawing skills. I don’t have to use a grid and most of the time I don’t use one at all. It just takes longer to get things right.

Thank you for sharing my art journey. Feel free not to read any further of you have no interest in my political opinions. This won’t hurt my feelings. Winifred

RESISTANCE FOR DEMOCRACY: First of all, I want to say, I stand with Senator Cory Booker! Amazing 25 hour + filibusterer in the Senate in opposition Donal/Elon criminality and attack to needed services in this country I stand with Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Chris Murphy, Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) and Jasmine Crockett. They are strong leaders of the resistance.

I decided “resistance” is a better theme than Ranting! Other than blowing off steam momentarily – which can feel good – it doesn’t move one forward in fact or in consciousness. So, I decided to focus on “the peoples resistance”. Despite what both of those crazy men – Donald and Elon – continue to do, ground roots efforts persist and are making progress. A great example of course is the election a couple days ago of liberal Supreme court Justice in Wisconsin who struggled against the financial support of Elon who funded her opposition but the opposition LOST. That’s a big deal. Town Hall meetings are attracting thousands of loud and angry citizens who are calling for Republican and Democratic leaders to do more to stop service reductions desperately needed by regular citizens and veterans of this country and the ruin of the economy. Then there is direct resistance to Elon and Tesla, where both demonstrations and declining purchases, are tanking Elon’s brand and wealth. In response, he exclaims how cruel it is that people express how happy they are to see his stock prices decline!!!! He waves his chain saw in glee, excited to lead cuts in federal programs but is surprised people are happy when he experiences misfortune. This is INSANITY and TOTAL LACK OF EMPATHY – plain and simple. Both Elon and Donald are deranged and have the same disease! And then there are the horrors of immigration!!

And now the tariffs extended to all countries! Things are moving in a very bad direction. Fortunately the resistance is growing – including resistance by those who foolishly voted for him because they thought his measures wouldn’t affect them – just all those other people. Now they know, he only cares about his billionaire buddies. It’s good to see them falling into line.

WE COULD HAVE HAD A WOMAN IN CHARGE – a smart qualified woman. These things wouldn’t be happening but this country and it’s many segments of the population have failed to support a woman as president. I BELIEVE the problem was far more that a female was contender, than that she is Black. Oh well, lets see what another week brings. Winifred

Related Images:

WW Haitian Girl Winifred Whitfield Still life WW Red Tree WW Fall Maple WW mom-child WW Portrait S ww-portrait-A