The Playful Hat (Ellis)

by Godfrey J. Ellis – Sep 2019 acrylic 12×12

This sweet granddaughter was sitting in my shopping cart in Target on one of our trips down to Sacramento. Full of life and fun, she reached over and grabbed a hat off a display and put it on. It was so playful that I snapped a photo. I immediately wanted to paint it as a Christmas gift, but with a more interesting background. It was a lot of fun painting her mouth. This was my first real portrait in almost 30 years and only my third portrait in my life. To pull it off, I studied a book on how to paint portraits in acrylic and practiced the mouth on scrap paper. The mouth came out okay, although the eyes aren’t quite right. Below is the reference photo:

Here she is not only holding the painting but mugging a similar pose to the one in the painting.

Here is a test painting (study) on paper and an early photo of the beginning of the final painting on canvas: