aboutimage galleriescontactsubscribe

My Day Job

NOVEMBER 3, 2006
Nehru and Gandhi
Yesterday as I was pulling the tape off of the edges of my newest painting I was pleasantly surprised. I have a cool job. We do, don't we? I have spent the past few weeks juggling home renovations, the Society of Illustrators Annual show duties, preparation for my NYC marathon run and then finally, my day job. I was asked several days ago it I could do a cover for Time Asia. They needed a portrait of Nehru and Gandhi. I'm sure they just wanted to use photos, but while Nehru is well documented, images of Gandhi are less available. The well known images are quite degraded in quality and don't match the better quality images of Nehru. The art director was nice enough to say that my painting of Gandhi for Time's Person of the Century was the best she found. I get jobs just for this reason: photography did not match well. I assume many of us who do portraits, do as well. In the final day, when I was adding all the tiny brushstrokes, I was getting thrilled. There's a great feeling I get when I'm excited to know this thing will be out there, and I'm putting my best foot forward, so to speak.
Here is a close up of Gandhi. Mucho brushstokes.
© 2024 Tim O'Brien