Sitting together, 2020, 61 x 45 cm, oil on canvas

2020, 61 x 45 cm, oil on canvas

This double oil portrait of an old woman and a young Black man sitting quietly in the same room, but not looking at each other, was painted with a limited palette of just three colours – viridian green, burnt sienna and titanium white. A palette used by contemporary figurative British artist James Bland in several of his paintings. This limited palette forced me to interpret the colours in front of me within the value and temperature spectrum and translate them accordingly.