As promised, I'm continuing to post illustrations I painted for Rosalind Laker's book, Venetian Mask, as published by Reader's Digest in 1993. This scene shows the heroine's best friend on her wedding day procession by gondola. She is visibly unhappy, because this is a forced marriage, due to economic circumstances and the guy she's marrying is known to be a real creep, but very wealthy and powerful. I wanted to give the viewpoint from gondola height, to direct the eye. The miserable bride is the focus of attention even though she is off to the right. In the printed book, this image was spread across the top of two pages with text below. Venice was still fresh in my mind from an earlier trip and I was excited to be able to place this scene in the Grand Canal. Did I take liberties with the architecture? Yes. And of course no bride would allow her wedding dress to drape into that water, which was even dirtier then, but it created such a nice flowing line and helped get across her defeated attitude, I did it anyway. I believe the model used for the bride is Sue Brown. Brigid Hobbie played the family member behind her in the gondola and I may have posed for the guy in front, but I'm not sure. This painting is four feet long, in oil on wood.Please leave your comments!
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4 comments:
The first thing I noticed was how miserable the bride looks. Another stunning painting.
Thanks again for your comment! It was a pleasant challenge to tell a more involved story , than the usual romance cover. You try to tell more of the story, but not too much. I think this one turned out pretty well.
James
How wonderful!
They are more beautiful than the other but this is my favorite.
I think it's my favorite, too, but they all have something that interested me when I was painting them. Thanks for your comment!
James
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