Linda Johnstone Allen
My approach to Portraiture is “various” depending on the materials which I am using.
Since taking your class, my former skills in pastel and conte crayon have resurfaced.
My ease at finding the “freedom” to bring out the general contours of the face, the surfaces, characteristics & expressions of a face have come back from years passed. I’ve always been interested in “Faces”, and particularly when I started working in ceramics about 10 years ago. I loved sculpture and making masks. Sometimes they were more “real” and sometimes very folk-oriented & designed with much texture and the additions of mixed media. To me, faces are “looking into another’s character and soul”, observing their distinctions, their countenance, human beauty, whether it’s pristine, or war-torn, fragile or very strong.
I started making faces and doing art simply by living with my artist teacher parents. I was surrounded with art from various parts of the world and working in many media while growing up. We were immersed in art from design to portraiture, painting, silkscreen & various genre. I also received my secondary art credential from USC and Occidental College.
I would say that my mother was my best portraiture teacher for me. She showed me how much color was in a face, in the shadows, in the patterns and in layers of paint which juxtapose next to one another. That is what your class brought back to my mind. As a matter of fact [the image featured here] is a portrait that she did of me in kindergarten, which knows the way I’d like to paint in the future.