Figure Drawing (NSFW): New Model! (Patreon)

This gal stopped by Michael's studio over the weekend by chance, and happened to mention she was a figure drawing model. He snapped up her number immediately and had her sit for us for this week's session! 

She was great! She came from an hour and a half away (so we kicked in a little more than usual to pay her), and halfway through most of the 5-minute breaks we gave her, she said "hey, I don't need the full break, wanna get back to the pose?" What a trooper! 

We'll have her next week, too. I'm excited to draw her again.

In case you're interested in the conclusion of Michael's varnish drama, he managed to get all of the cracked varnish off his 4-foot-tall piece, painstakingly rubbing 250-some Q-tips dipped in solvent, over the course of 10 hours. The painting is now where it belongs, five hours away at a museum in our state capital, Charleston, West Virginia.

I was curious about how the varnish worked, that the solvent managed to only remove the varnish and not the oil paint (I know nothing about opaque paints; I work almost entirely in watercolor). In case you're interested, the varnish you use to seal a painting doesn't bond to the paint itself; it's more like a very thin, flat protective layer of plastic wrap. 

Michael explained that he was pushing the varnish's limits by applying it so early after he'd finished the painting; oil paints don't dry from evaporation like a watercolor does. It's actually a chemical process. The process can take months, years, even DECADES to completely stop, which means that the varnish needs to give the paints a chance (air, I'm guessing) to continue its drying process. Crazy stuff.

I think I'll stick to watercolor.