Two charcoal portraits I drew live at The Treaty Centre in Hounslow. Both real gentleman from Rumania.
The spiky one Alex Szakacs, I got pretty good, the one with the cap Ionui Martac, I succeeded with the features but got the shape of his head wrong, the cap is too big which lead to the mistakes that followed with the top of the head too large and the jaw area too pointed. If he is reading this blog, please get in touch and arrange another sitting - at half-price! So that I can have another go.

Recent Live Portraits

Just to give you some idea of the diversity of people who sit for me at the shopping centres I work in , mostly in the London area.

This is a miracle baby! I drew her portrait in Walthamstow, East London. Her grandmother told me that the baby`s mother had no idea she was pregnant when she gave birth to her!

This portrait of these 2 charming ladies - mum & daughter - will be flying to Zimbabwe, as the mother is going back for a visit to that troubled country., I didn`t have to ask them to smile, they were chortling for the whole time it took me to do their portraits - about 45 minutes.

An interesting couple sat for me when I did portraits (& caricatures!) at a shopping centre in Farnborough, Hampshire. The beautiful, graceful lady is from Poland and her friend is from Afghanistan, he was amazedwhen I told him that I stayed in Kabul for 3 weeks in 1979 when it was a hippie\tourist stopping off point on the great route through the middle east to Asia.

Did this portrait of the great Jimi Hendrix last week to show at a shopping centre that I was promoting my work in over the weekend. Along came a man who said to me - `I used to know him`, turned out to be a record producer who worked with him in the 60`s. He also worked with Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and many others from those crazy days. This is why I like to get out of the studio, where I only have Radio 4 for company, and get out to busy places where one never knows who will pass by.

This lovely lady bought the dress expressly for the portrait sitting,she was a bit disappointed that I couldn`t fit much of it in.