Muy Guapo (Garcia)

by Godfrey J. Ellis – October 2020 Acrylic 16×20

I painted a portrait of a small restaurant owner as a surprise gift to encourage him during the Covid pandemic of 2020 (see “The Bandanna” on this website). The owner liked it so much that on one of our later trips to his restaurant, he pulled a tiny, blurry B&W photo of himself at 17-years-old from his wallet. “Can you do theese?” he asked me.

Below is what he gave me. I gulped and said, “Yes, probably….” He then commissioned a 16×20 portrait that he insisted be called “Young Garcia” even though that was not his name. It was the only photo he had of himself as a youth. “I waz very ‘andsome then,” he said. “Muy Guapo,” I said. “Si, back then; not now,” he replied. “Oh, yes …you STILL are…!” I told him.

I didn’t know how to get a resemblance based on what he had given me. So, I ran it through an artists’ refining app. To my great happiness, the app returned the image on the right. Amazing, don’t you think?

I still had to colorize the B&W photo. At the end, Don and his wife were thrilled with the painting, which matches the first one. Here they are holding it before it was framed and put up on the wall.

They mounted the two together, along with the reference photos, as you can see.

Here are two early stages in the portrait: