Narrative PortRait Painter's Critique

I love everything about this class. Today was our first critique of the semester. For those new to “Crits”, they are a great time to learn while looking at other people’s work. I think critiques can oftentimes be the most important part of the learning process.
We ask basic questions:
What are we looking at?
What palette are you using if you had to define it in terms of color theory?
What is working in this painting?
How is the narrative part of the story reading to the painter vs. the audience?
What isn’t working? How can it be better?
what technical aspects (often drawing, color or values) need to be altered to accommodate the painting?

At this point, none of these works are complete. Instead they exist in various stages of problem-solving and we get fresh eyes and recommendations during the process to help better the outcome.

Sometimes critiques have their challenges because they’re exposing a personal process, but when students are open to engaging in them, the speed of their learning is clearly expedited. As an instructor, I learn new things from my students all the time. They keep my eyes trained.

This class in particular is really funny (could be all the wine?). I’m pretty certain a comedy show, or stage play could easily be written about it based solely on the random conversations we have. Their work is pretty stellar too. 😉