A few days back, I had , "a beat stuck in my
head" after watching a random video of belly dancers on you tube, and I knew I just had to paint one .Normally I paint directly from a single photo reference, not deviating too much from the original photo.However since , I couldn't find a satisfactory photo reference on my favourite reference photo site Paint My Photo, I knew I had to actually work to translate the beat onto paper.
So I began by looking at a number of reference
photos, and quite a few videos of belly dancers in action. Then , I did a few pencil and ( one) colour sketches to find a pose that felt
right to me.
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| Belly Dancer Sketch 1 (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury |
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| Belly Dancer Sketch 2 (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury |
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| Belly Dancer Sketch 3 (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury |
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| Belly Dancer Final Sketch on 300 gsm Watercolour paper, (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury |
Once I had settled on the pose that
I liked, I did a free hand watercolour sketch on a sample of watercolour paper
I would use for the final painting, to see how the colours, that I had in mind , would look on paper.
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| Belly Dancer Freehand Watercolour Sketch on 300 gsm Watercolour paper (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury |
Now, this is not my usual process of painting, in that I generally don't have the
patience to do so much preparatory work before actually painting what I
want to paint.The reason why I've decided to record this process here is to remind myself when Im feeling lazy, that preparation is worth it!
Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the process , so here's the final painting-
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| 'Belly Dancer' Original Watercolour , (c) Monishikha RoyChoudhury , Size 6"x 9" |
Also, in case you're interested in looking at ( or buying) more of my figurative and other watercolours, do visit my Facebook page, 'The Coloured Wall' . If you're interested in buying greeting cards or museum quality prints of my artwork, please visit my profile on Fine Art America .
