Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Happy Birthday to Pat Torok

Deb Dougherty had seen us at the Lakewood Arts Festival. After seeing some of Norms portraits, Deb started to come up with an idea for her Mom's 80th birthday. Deb and her siblings wanted to do something very special.

Deb and her sister Mary came over to brainstorm a couple of ideas for a painting for her mom. Combing through their family pictures the sisters realized that it would be great to have a portrait of their mom and dad together.

 This was the photo they liked.


They liked the expression of their dad. It captured his sense of humor and his coffee mug that was usually in his hand. But Deb and Mary soon realized that their mother's eyes were closed. Deb reported that she usually complained when the camera captured her that way. At first we worked to paint the eyes opened but it seemed unnatural. Something else was not working.

So we asked for more pictures.  Deb brought us several more. So we out of the second group of pictures we picked this one.


Deb assured me this photo was a good capture of how her mom looked.
Well she even had the same earrings.

 Using the two above photos for reference, Norman came up with the following painting for Pat's birthday.


Here is a portrait of Art and Pat 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM
 with love from Deb, Mary, Michael, Chris, Joe and Katie

We thank Deb and her family for this wonderful opportunity of doing their parents portrait.