I Just Want to Squeeze Him!

By Kate Bradley 4 November 2013, 8:02AM

That’s what I heard from two of my clients when I revealed the recently completed charcoal portrait of their son. They expressed how cute he looked. His mom said she wished she had gotten charcoals done of her other kids when they were young, too.

My clients loved the way his little hands looked, like he was nervous and shy. They said he twisted in fingers like that often.

Often my clients will commission a charcoal portrait when the child is young, around two or three, and an oil portrait when they are a bit older, around 4, 5, or 6. Moms tell me that they love the way they look at 2, and want to capture that time as well, without having to invest in a full-length oil. This need inspired me to offer the Legacy Collection, which is a series of three portraits at different stages in the child’s life: a small charcoal at 2, a ¾ length oil at 4, and a full-length oil at 6, or whatever ages the parents want. Because children change so much during this time, I wanted my clients to have a way to capture each moment. It’s kind of like school pictures.

Aha! Moments

By Kate Bradley 19 September 2013, 10:20AM Someone asked me the other day if I preferred painting children or adults. Children, hands down, I said (no offense to all the grown-ups out there). For one, you don’t have to make them look younger, thinner or more beautiful. They are perfect just the way they are.

I was at the Dixon recently to see their current exhibit, Picturing America. My dear friend Julie was leading the tour. (Side note: If you have not been on a tour with Julie, stop what you are doing now and go. She makes learning about art so enjoyable and refreshing.) We stopped at a portrait of two European boys playing outside, one with a yo-yo. Julie told us that up until about the mid-eighteenth century, all children in portraits looked like small adults. Stiff, regally dressed, and very serious. Until that point, children weren’t considered individuals. Childhood was just a way to get to adulthood and so children were reflected in their portraits they way their parents wanted them to become.

The stuff of nightmares.This is a boy, btw. A boy with a walking cane.

Then things began to shift. Childhood began to be considered as a special time. Children were recognized as the individuals that they are, with their own personalities and interests. And so the portraits of children became much more lively and expressive, often depicting them in outdoors, associated with nature.

Meet Ansel. Ansel enjoys rabbits, decorative headwear, and macrame.

But seriously, HUGE improvement over Creepy Shrunken Person.

I had one of those “a-ha!” moments. Or rather, something I already new was reminded to me in a delightful way. This is the essence of what I do: celebrating childhood. I always seek to represent the individual personality of the children in my portraits, but I had never really considered why. I don’t just want to stick every child I paint in front of a garden- there are plenty of those portraits.  I want their portrait to reflect who they are as individuals: their interests, their personalities, and their uniqueness. Why? Because childhood is special. Wow, I thought. What a privilege it is to get to paint these precious and fleeting moments. To preserve them forever in a commissioned work of art. I’m truly honored.

Celebrating Aristocracy vs. Celebrating Family Relationships

For the past year I have been working with a business coach. One of the things she has encouraged me to do is to look at the careers of successful artists to understand what made them successful. Where they just really good artists or was there something more?

I started thinking about John Singer Sargent, the most successful portrait painter of all time and one of my favorite artists. He earned about $130,000 per commission in today’s dollars. Amazing.

How was he so successful? I used to assume it was because of his talent. Yet there are many talented artists today working in obscurity. He was a wonderful painter to be sure, but as I have discovered talent alone is not enough to be successful. He had to have done something more

His "more" was the unique value to he offered to his target market, the English nobility of his day. He helped them elevate their status in society. That was very important to these people. He celebrated their wealth and status and portrayed them in his portraits as rich, noble, and beautiful. He idealized them. That was why he was so successful.  He was also extremely well connected in his target market. He knew people. It was a status symbol to even get a meeting with him. It meant you were somebody. And if he agreed to paint you, well, that really meant you were somebody. He wouldn’t just paint everyone. You had to be the right kind of person with the right connections.

Sargent and I are both portrait painters but with very different missions. He elevated aristocracy; I help people honor and celebrate their family relationships. He catered to nobility; I cater to moms. Their children are very important to them and they invest a lot of time, energy and money into their well-being.

Like Sargent, my portraits are not available to everyone. I can only do a limited amount per year, so I have to be selective about who I take on as a client. We both cater to a luxury market, but I focus on helping them celebrate their family relationships. It’s all about finding your “tribe” and celebrating their values. Helping them, serving them and making their lives better.