Portraits of Success

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  We grow up looking at the images of old portrait paintings and photography that fill our history books and museums. The people depicted in these images are the people who we are taught revolutionized the world. Because of this, old-fashioned poses, expressions and antique clothing are all features we often associate with “important” people. Often, in vintage portraits, people are captured from a side angle and possess a calm, impassive expression or perhaps a slight smile that makes them appear to know something we don’t.

   I took photos of my friends from a similar angle with dramatic lighting.  Their expressions emit a confident, optimistic, and an almost enlightened feel common in old paintings or photographs.

To show these people looking forward to their future success, I colored overtop of the photos I took of them with colored pencil. I gave them old fashioned clothing and hair styles to draw the parallels between them and the great scientists, artists, healthcare professionals, and business entrepreneurs that came before them.

   These people are all important to me. Even though you, the viewer, may not know them, this project is meant to accentuate their significance as people with great potential. This project displays six people who all have different dreams and can do anything with their lives.

   This project also serves as a reminder to both myself, and to you the viewer, to appreciate those around us now. We eventually must all go in our own directions to achieve our goals and inevitably, our present will become our past.

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    2019

    Colored Pencil and Pen on Printed Photo

   All pieces are 11" x 8 1/2"