A Gift For a Friend

I warmed up by doing some studies of Mucha's work. They're not quite exact, but I was just trying to get a feel for his aesthetic sense in terms of composistion, line weights and the types of shapes and curve he used.




I never thought it would happen, but one of my oldest friends just got married. He met a great girl on a shoot in Japan and now he's snatched her and brought her back to live with him here in captivity. In the spirit of welcoming her to our great nation, I figured now would be a good time to put my skills to work in a painting that commemorates their wedding day. I wanted to cross-pollinate the simple graphic beauty of Japanese woodblock prints with the Art Nouveau elegance of Mucha's posters. This is very different to the work I've been normally doing and so it was lots of fun and quite a challenge. I worked on a couple of others before I reached this version which I feel can be appreciated by both my friend and his wife. Anyway, congratulations to them!