Creating a Composite Picture

The finished masterpiece

Our members brought along their paints to our September meeting to paint a composite picture based on a painting by Cesare Vecellio. The evening was led by David Coleman, who had divided a large photo of Cesare’s famous painting “Portrait of a Large Family” into postcard sized pieces.

Our task was to reproduce one of these pieces using our preferred medium on an A4 sized piece of paper or card, and to complete the work in less than two hours. This was quite a task and meant that we had to work quickly with a relatively dark source photo.

Working furiously with our paint brushes and making cheerful banter, most of us managed to complete the task (somewhat) and at the end we assembled each painting in a grid and compared it with the grand master’s original. If Cesare were alive today, I’m sure he would have howled with laughter at our meagre attempts at realism art!

Sections of the original

We were four participating artists short of completing the work, but four intrepid volunteers came forward to complete the missing parts at home in their leisure.

Hopefully our handiwork when finished, will be assembled and be on display at our forthcoming exhibition later this month.

Left: Alan Walker well into his piece

Ken Lilley gets to grips with his part

Leslie Burrows flying along