I spent a week in a cabin in Vermont alone last summer. No plumbing, running water or electricity. There were no images at all except on my shrine and the nature surrounding me.
I think I came back with a fresher eye. I was astonished at how much of the portrait work looked alike, even though it was done by a myriad of artists, coming from multiple experiences.
Photography forces you to look at things the way it sees. You don't get to interpret what is in front of you until the camera does. It is like communicating using a translator.
When you have a photograph in front of you, there it is. Done. The next step is what I call rendering, yes rendering. Frozen possibilities. Is it close to the photograph or not? That is how we are forced to judge it.
There is the quality of danger when you paint from life. Will something happen to the subject or model before I finish. Will I have to change my original concept because something more interesting came up? Can I actually get this vibrating , moving subject on a canvas? It is truly frightening and therein lies the challenge.
Perhaps I have a more jaundiced eye and I agree there are a lot of very successful portrait artists, out there making a lot of money and employing photographs. Financial success in the arts, as so often has been the case does not mean greatness.
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