In the mid-2000s I started painting again after a hiatus that began around 1998. One of the first projects I created was a series of larger format acrylic paintings based on portraits of actors from the past.
The style of these paintings was a chance to experiment with a more colorful, graphic, and stylized execution from my usual style. I worked with bolder colors, blocky shapes, and thin outlines.
The first three were female actors: Gloria Grahame, Tamara Dobson, and Veronica Lake. I decided to shift to a set of male actors next. The first one up was Robert Conrad and then Oliver Reed.
The Robert Conrad piece was started way back in 2009 as a more traditionally rendered portrait in oil. At some point in the early under-painting phase, I brushed in some colored shapes following the planes of his face and then... I stopped painting again.
Cut to this year. I returned to my art in a chapter of life. Finishing up the Robert Conrad portrait had long been on my list of lingering projects. I got back to it.
The learned lesson here is that acrylic paint is a much better choice to work with rather than oil.
