"i am lakhota": first features

here are the first steps in painting the features on marlene. i painted these exactly like i do all the noses and eyes i have done so far on this blog and will refer the reader back to any other portrait sequence. the only difference is that alizarin crimson permanent was substituted for the cadmium red light and quinacridone gold was substituted for the cadmium yellow pale. i used a #6 round kolinski sable brush that pointed well. for the side plane of the *left* side of her face i put a swatch of cerulean blue lateral to the eye and then loaded the brush (switched to a #10 round) with the alizarin/gold combination and painted down using rolling horizontal movements in one continuous stroke until reaching the neck and/or running out of paint (i can't remember which). the point is not to lift the brush until i was finished with the stroke. i put a little more dark just lateral to the side plane of the face near the eye so that the hair would blend into the face at this point. then i scratched in a strand or two of hair when the sheen came off the wash using the palette knife.  here is a whole painting view and a close up of the face.