Joanne Chadwick

I mentioned in an earlier post how I created a portrait of Joanne Chadwick. She's actually the first artist that I've illustrated, although I've been tempted to do Salvador Dali.

Joanne is actually a superb artist in the fine art tradition. Both her portraiture and landscape work are very impressive.

You can visit Joanne on twitter here

She also has her own blog site which displays some of her work here

Let's start with her portrait work:

This portrait of Mick Jagger is the best I've seen of him. I was in a gallery in Cambridge recently and they were displaying some of the paintings that Ronnie Wood has created of his band mates. The prints alone are selling for £1500 each. For me they are no where near this quality at all.

I'm getting all kinds of things from this. Movement, exitement, the stage lights and playing around the edges of the image and in the hair. You've got all the character lines and the mojo - it's just superb.

Two female portraits here of contrasting characters who both have boho qualities in their own way - uber posh Helena Bonham Carter and tragic genius Amy Winehouse.

I'll be honest - I've tried to do a portrait of Amy Winehouse before and I failed utter because I couldn't capture what has been secured here so easily. The combination of obstinate intransigence mixed with glamour, chic and beauty - and that other piece of x factor.

Helena Bonham Carter is also shown with that multi dimensional quality - pour character out of every line and colour. Frenetic hair, shadows, and contrast. I just love that neither of these portraits are smiling and that is so much more of a challenge in itself. 

Now enjoy this picture of Ted Hughes:

It's brilliant. The context is perfect. He looks happy to be cold and windsweep and possibly saturated with rain. The slate grey and dark blue in the sky is at war with the shards of light to give the feeling of one of those dark days. The texture of his skin - and again his ruddiness and the line of shadow are so compelling. I love the detail of the hair just coming across the face, the touch of pink in the cheek, nose tip and chin say everything about how cold that picture is. Despite that, it retains some warmth and heaps of ambiguity. Is he cross, is he about to smile?

Joanne's landscapes are also a real joy:

I've picked just three from a wonderful broad collection. The image above is particularly evocative for me because my dad's uncle worked with heavy horses and kept a shire he called Peggy that he used to plough a series of allotments in Barnsley.

These images are very special in my eyes. They have texture and feel and mood in great quantities. It's like a fond memory.

The image above is almost like a mirage in so many ways. I really enjoy the depth and the darkness and the sense of being able to wade into that long grass.

My final pick from the landscapes was this family of pigs. I was really caught by how Joanne has captures the coarse hairy quality of the pigs as they snuffle around.

Joanne offers the following about herself: