Marty Jessup
Colourful Portraits, Landscapes and Still-life with a focus on Contemporary Realism. I am a fine artist working mainly in oils. My work varies in size from small 12 x 10 inch pieces right up to large 5 x 4 feet stretched canvas frames.
I am interested in people and places and from a very young age I have been making faces. I have taught life drawing for 9 years and like figurative art too.
As an artist predominantly painting portraiture I will often find myself painting and studying someones face for hours. I work from photos but always try to meet and ‘get to know’ a bit about that person. It might be the clothes they wear, the artefacts they collect, or even the things that they say.
We are all unique and it is this ‘presence’ that I want to evoke. The body gives me clues, they way someone sits or what they are doing with
their hands for instance are helpful for the subject.
It’s not just about a likeness, it’s about an essence, a sort of recording of their persona and soul. Where as a photo captures a moment in time - my method takes many days and hours and during my studio time I am trying to get under their skin. It is a balance between
technical skill together with empathic intuition.
Sometimes it’s a collaboration with the sitter, discussing ideas and sometimes it’s left up to me as to how I portray them.
I have studied Hans Holbein the younger, Rembrandt van Rijn, Laura Knight, John Singer Sargent, Lucian Freud, Jenny Saville, and many of my contemporaries and i am a realist painter.
If you are looking for a work of art that is both colourful, characterful and evocative, then visit the website for further examples: