The Prime Directive

Mary the Mother of Jesus
oil on canvas, 14 x 11
Copyright Peter Bougie, 2017

There is another artwork for the head of Mary associated with Luke 2:19. My original intention was that it be a color study to use in producing the final work, and it served that purpose. However, after finishing Luke, I got a notion to work out some visual ideas in the study and turn it into a small work of its own. I titled it identical to the charcoal drawing: Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

Cecelia posed 4 sessions for the color study. I painted it directly from life onto the canvas, rather than transferring an outline using a tracing made from the charcoal drawing, etc. Working that way, it took me all four sessions from life to get the painting to a point where I was satisfied with the color notes. At that stage, however, the drawing of Cecelia’s features in the painting – the ‘likeness’ to nature- was off. The angle of the nose was wrong, both along the ridge of the nose and underneath, above the upper lip; the eye was too low, and the chin was too small. You portrait painters can all relate, I’m sure. Still, being pressed for time, I decided that since the color in the study was decent, and since I had an accurate charcoal and chalk drawing, I would proceed by using the drawing as my main reference for the head of Mary in Luke, and the painting as a reference for color. That’s a bit of a tricky process that I don’t recommend as a general procedure, although neither do I say “never”. I expected I would encounter a certain difficulty, and I did.  As I was looking at the color study for the color notes I needed, I tended to want to reproduce it’s drawing inaccuracies in the larger painting, and I had to resist the inclination to do so. A sort of prime directive I recieved as a student was to "make it like" - like nature, like what I saw. Instructions delivered and received repeatedly become habits, and so I always want to "make it like". I had to consciously contrive a tactic employing mental discipline, to look each time at the drawing for shape after checking the color against the painting. And when I had the color where I wanted it, I put the color study aside and used the drawing alone as my reference.

After Luke was finished, I developed the color study in variation to the finished painting. Again I used the charcoal and chalk drawing as a reference for the likeness of the features. This time, however, the head in profile with its red veil was the sole focal point, instead of being part of the main focal point, highlighted by the surrounding halo and subdued flat color value of the background. The theme is entirely focused on Mary’s contemplation.