Faeral

Phew! Finally finished (bar a few tweaks when I look at it again in a few days time) after starting it in October. Only managed to get a few hours work done on it every four days or so due to being away a lot from my studio to help out my elderly parents 150 miles away. 
Inspired by seeing shots of my model Naomi Wood taken at a music festival in the summer I asked her to pose in the head dress that a friend had made for her. One of the shots Naomi described as  "feral" when she crouched down with her fingers touching the ground and I decided that that was what I wanted, a feral fairy, which  I condensed together for the title "Faeral". I saw her as some sort of woodland nymph/fairy suddenly glimpsed in the dense branches and roots, a few shafts of light catching her face and body. I wanted the figure to merge into into the background so I kept the colours within a pretty narrow range of reds to yellow/greens, the complicated setting trying to distract the eye so the denizen of the woodland mixes in with her realm. It is very hard to photograph this picture as the figure is a bit less distinct against the background than it seems here. I might do another one whereby the figure is much more hidden behind branches etc...
Oil on linen 20" x 30"
There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.