tuesday painterly artist – michelle parsley part one

tuesday painterly artist – michelle parsley part one

Tuesday Painterly Art
Michelle Parsley M.Photog, M. Artist, Cr., CPP

I had the pleasure of taking a Michelle Parsley full day Pre-Con class at Imaging USA this year. I was extremely impressed with her attention to detail and classroom style. If you ever get the opportunity to learn from Michelle, I highly recommend it. BTW, you can also work with Michelle online. Check out links to her education at the bottom of the post.

Hear now from Michelle below as she talks about her work and producing images for PPA’s International Photographic Competition. All Images © Michelle Parsley 2019 All Rights Reserved

michelle parsley image“For most of my client work, I create “pretty pictures” in either digital or traditional mediums. An
example of client work would be “A Study in Pastels”.

But when I’m given free rein to do anything I want — I love to tell stories with my images. I
believe storytelling is one of my artistic strengths and I find it especially satisfying when others
can easily see the story. I often employ this tactic in my competition images.

michelle parsley imageSometimes, I am compelled to tell a serious story — like in the image “Dear John”. Anyone
that has served in our armed forces can easily identify with this image.

michelle parsley imageMore often than not, I tell humorous stories like “Dinner and a Show”. What little one hasn’t
used a pot for a drum and sang at the top of their lungs? By giving him an audience of
puppies in a barn, it accurately reflects the realities of life with boys on the farm. (No — this
child is not one of my boys)

michelle parsley imageIn “Who’s Training Whom?” You can really get a glimpse into my imagination. I had the
pleasure of visiting the old Sheldon Church ruins in the Charleston, SC area with Tiffany Briley
of Charleston Photography Tours a few years back. I couldn’t help but let my imagination run
wild! What a giggle it was to have Julia Kelleher photograph her son based on my directions,
and create this fanciful image of a friendly dragon. The dragon was created by photographing
a plastic toy from several angles and frankensteining it together in Photoshop.

Continued next week!

Behind every artist there is a story and Michelle’s story began as a child when she would draw or paint with anything she could find (which got her in trouble on more than one occasion!). She has been creating hand drawn and hand
painted art for clients for nearly 20 years. Michelle is mostly self-taught in all the mediums she uses to express
her creativity. By combining her love of both digital and organic mediums, Michelle is uniquely equipped to both create and teach art. Michelle earned her Certified Professional Photographer (CPP) designation from Professional
Photographers of America (PPA) in 2009 which led her to enter her first International
Photographic Competition in 2010.

She has since earned the Master of Photography michelle parsley head shot art
and Master Artist degrees in 2014, diamond artist of the year in 2012, the
Imaging Excellence Award in 2015, Photographic Craftsman in 2017, Double diamond and the Imaging Excellence Bar in 2018.

When Michelle is not teaching, photographing, or painting, she enjoys a great cup of coffee, dark chocolate, and working on the family farm in rural Tennessee where she lives with her husband of over 25 years, their four children, four dogs, and an ever changing host of farm animals.

 

The class I took from Michelle – Photoshop Clone Painting

More Clone Painting Classes – All Clone Painting Classes

General Teaching site – Elevate Your Art

 

art study

art study

Phoenix Art Museum – Study

Madame Koch & Her Children

Oil on canvas Madame Koch & Her Children – by Julius Rolshoven

For the last several years I have been spending quite a bit of time at museums studying the art of painting. This includes color theory, composition, techniques for creating reality and more. I do this to try to make my photography art stronger. For those that don’t know I am pushing into the art market with my work. I now consider myself a ‘Lens Based Artist.’ I’ll be exploring different paintings and ideas in future posts.

‘Lens Based Artist?’ You might ask, “What the heck is that, Bob?” All of my source imagery comes through the lens of a camera. But then there is a divergence from photography as I mix, match and manipulate the files. More on this in future blog posts.

Back to the study of art.

I have viewed this image numerous times, and perhaps you can help me a bit. No matter where I stand all eyes in the painting follow me around the room. I have a feeling there is a name for this phenomenon but I haven’t been able to find out what that is. If you know, please chime in.

Painting of Madame Koch and her Children at Phoenix Museum of Art

Child – The Older

Child the Younger

Madame Koch herself

I thought that it was the position of the eye within the eye socket that was the cause of the effect of following you around the room. As you can see from the close crops that the eyes are all in different positions. I find this perplexing. This is quite a large painting, and I’m not sure if that has anything to do with this effect.

If you have any ideas on this, please let me know!

Yours in Creative Photography,       Bob