Alan

This is Alan. I first met him about 12 years ago when he called me looking for an architect/designer to help him renovate a building out in Montville, Maine that he was developing into an artists retreat. We worked on the design for a few weeks but he ultimately decided (wisely, I think) to put his energy and vision into creating Waterfall Arts, a contemporary community art center in Belfast, Maine that has been instrumental in helping to cultivate a thriving art scene in the Midcoast.

8.5"x14" watercolor and pencil with Artrage. #250

Kate #2

This is Kate - again. This is the other portrait I was working on at the same time I was working on the last portrait I posted. She looks like a model here. I imagine what was really going on is she was goofing around with her friends and she struck a classic model pose and after the photo was snapped she broke into laughter.

This was a pencil drawing that felt unfinished to me for a few days. I was thinking about adding color and came across a facebook post of a color wheel done in watercolor by my friend Jessie Chapman - an architect and artist living in Virginia. It was posted on Sunday with #love and I understood it to be about the shooting in Orlando. It represents the solidarity/love that many of us feel with the LGBT community right now. And it seemed right for Kate's portrait.

11x17 Pencil in my huge Moleskine sketchbook with Artrage.#249.5

Kate

This is Kate. She and my son were classmates when they went to Montessori fifteen years ago. She was an adorable girl then and has grown to become a beautiful young woman in so many ways. I made two portraits of her because I couldn't decide which photo to use. I worked on them both at the same time in my huge Moleskine sketchbook, flipping back and forth. It was kind of interesting doing it that way because she was a few years younger in the photo I worked off of for this portrait but my portrait makes her look a few years older - closer to the way she looks in the other portrait I was drawing - closer to the way she looks now.

I wrote "u are free" all over her face. This was a phrase that got stuck in my brain when I was in Nepal recently. It's not entirely random that I wrote it on her but I also don't know exactly why I did - I could say that about so many of the things I do to these portraits. I am aware she has visited Nepal and has an affinity for the people there and that part of the world. For me, "u are free" became a mantra of sorts. Something I would think about from time to time. Am I free? What does it mean to be free? Are any of us really free? I saw it written in spray paint on a brick wall on the drive from the airport in Kathmandu to my hotel. A simple piece of graffiti that got stuck in my brain and now it's a value for Kate's portrait. If you have any thoughts about this portrait or the phrase "u are free" I would love for you to comment.

11x17 pencil in my huge Moleskine sketchbook. #249