Cousin Harold
"Is this guy really your cousin?" I'm asked that all the time at shows and actually he's my husband's cousin. If the family ever took a vote on the Black Sheep of the family, Harold would get the nod...in a landslide.
If you didn't know him and accidentally bumped into him, you'd run...in the opposite direction... ..fast. Harold's appearance and unconventional life style were the topic of many lively family discussions. He had a pretty rough childhood and was the oldest of seven kids. Harold was always on his best behavior when he showed up in Maine for a visit and we enjoyed his wild stories..even though he cleaned them up for us.
This is pastel over watercolor on a very heavy cotton rag paper called Khadi that's handmade in India. Originally the background was blocked in with dark watercolor washes for trees and deep woods. It was too distracting so I scrubbed it out and changed it to the desolate landscape and troubling sky you see here. I wondered if the paper would hold out as I reworked the background and his eyes over and over again in pastel...it did.
This image has more red in it than the real painting...bad lighting.
As for Harold..He now sits in a Florida prison, maybe for the rest of his life. You know what they say, "The ones who are the hardest to love, are the ones who need it the most".
This painting won a Merit Award in the Pastel Painters of Maine International Show at the River Tree Center for the Arts, Kennebunk. Me., several years ago.
"Is this guy really your cousin?" I'm asked that all the time at shows and actually he's my husband's cousin. If the family ever took a vote on the Black Sheep of the family, Harold would get the nod...in a landslide.
If you didn't know him and accidentally bumped into him, you'd run...in the opposite direction... ..fast. Harold's appearance and unconventional life style were the topic of many lively family discussions. He had a pretty rough childhood and was the oldest of seven kids. Harold was always on his best behavior when he showed up in Maine for a visit and we enjoyed his wild stories..even though he cleaned them up for us.
This is pastel over watercolor on a very heavy cotton rag paper called Khadi that's handmade in India. Originally the background was blocked in with dark watercolor washes for trees and deep woods. It was too distracting so I scrubbed it out and changed it to the desolate landscape and troubling sky you see here. I wondered if the paper would hold out as I reworked the background and his eyes over and over again in pastel...it did.
This image has more red in it than the real painting...bad lighting.
As for Harold..He now sits in a Florida prison, maybe for the rest of his life. You know what they say, "The ones who are the hardest to love, are the ones who need it the most".
This painting won a Merit Award in the Pastel Painters of Maine International Show at the River Tree Center for the Arts, Kennebunk. Me., several years ago.
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