Revisiting a portrait - 18 years later

Draft portrait - Robert William Barber
16 x 20, oil on panel
copyright Jeanette Jobson

Ok, I have that watercolour/self portrait thing out of my system for the moment. Now I need to concentrate on some other projects, one of which are some test illustrations for my daughter's wedding invitations.

I haven't been given a lot of direction in what they want as the backdrop for the invitations, except for ideas for an old sepia map of Newfoundland or coastal scenes in blues. I'll work on a few test pieces and see if anything appeals to them.

I found a 16 x 20 oil portrait that I started of my father before he died, which was 1990. I had the bones of it in place, but then he died and it got pushed to the back and I had more or less forgotten about the portrait until I unearthed it last weekend.

I would like to finish it, but haven't got the reference image that I used for the original piece. I'm hoping that with what I have done so far and some other photos or him, I can make it work. The background was toned with black - I need to lighten that and bring in some other colours so it won't be so stark. Its also difficult to get a good photo of the portrait with that very dark background. I'll try again tomorrow with better lighting to capture the composition and overall feel of the piece as it currently exists.