Young Girl with Hand on her Shoulder

"Like a bird before a snake" is a comment by one of the first scholars of miniature painting, made in 1927, about the miniature in the presence of the photograph, meaning fascinated and then swallowed. Actually they influenced each other for decades. Interestingly enough, I came to this craft through the art of hand tinting photographs, being one of the last in a long line of hand tinters working for a 3rd generation photo studio in Charleston. It was just about when the job became defunct in 2003 due to the rise in digital photography, that I started making this series of portraits and so for years, I just drew them and colored the pictures with Marshall's Photo oils. sold.

This painting is copied from a hand painted daguerrotype from the 1800's. It was actually very difficult to translate into an oil painting because it had deep shadows but its so interesting in the light of my process and coming full circle in a way. Available.